House v. NCAA settlement: What it means, why it happened and what happens next?

The NCAA and the Power 5 conferences came to an agreement last week to settle a pending lawsuit, House v. NCAA, which will allow schools to directly pay student-athletes. 

There are a million ways you can talk about this. But if anyone tries to definitively tell you what exactly this means or what will happen as a result, then they’re lying to you. Nobody knows exactly how this will play out. 

Let’s take a 30,000-foot view of the situation. The NCAA settled instead of risking losing another lawsuit – and losing this lawsuit had the potential to cripple not only the NCAA, but all of collegiate athletics.