UGA, Nebraska, and Tennessee’s reps sent big prediction on involvement at Trump’s college sports roundtable

President Donald Trump has the world on an uncertain brink. Amid the chaos, college sports’ own uncertainty somehow isn’t being ignored. This Friday, Trump’s assembly of notable names across the sports world will help figure out what direction collegiate athletics is heading in as the NIL/rev-share era continues to see gaudy investments radically transform the product.

As USA Today’s Matt Hayes points out, while the presence of Nick Saban, Tim Tebow, Tiger Woods, and the like will make the headlines, a trio of university bigwigs will be the power players at the negotiating table.

In particular, University of Georgia president Jere Morehead, University of Nebraska chancellor Jeff Gold, and University of Tennessee chancellor Donde Plowman are Hayes’ “Big Three to make things work.”

“You can have Tiger or Timmy or Condi Rice or Adam Silver (Adam Silver?). My money is on the Big Three ― Morehead, Gold and Plowman ― to make this thing work,” Hayes prefaced before saying, “Because despite what you believe, despite how Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti and SEC commissioner Greg Sankey have become the bad guys in this deal, they’re simply herding cats. Or in this case, university presidents and chancellors who make every decision.

“This isn’t about Trump, though his bully pulpit helps. This isn’t about Nick Saban and his championships, or Tony Dungy or an NFL owner or the reality that no players or player representatives have been asked to attend. 

“Nothing changes without the Big Ten and SEC saying it does. And the three surface nobodies who are the biggest somebodies to finally making it happen.”

UGA's Jere Morehead is the most powerful president or chancellor in college sports

Hayes labeled UGA’s Morehead as “the most powerful president or chancellor in the SEC, and likely college sports” and “the most hands-on sports administrator in the nation.” What’s conceived at offices in Athens helps define college sports as we know them.

In 2025, Georgia’s governor, Brian Kemp, allowed UGA and the rest of the Peach State’s universities and colleges to negotiate deals with student-athletes directly. Virginia was the first state to pass any laws related to NIL/rev-share, and Arkansas was the first state to make NIL earnings tax-exempt, forcing the taxpayer to subsidize NCAA teams.

We’ll see if Morehead will take the lead on Friday. It sounds like there’s a good chance he does.