How NCAA Track & Field Recruiting Changed: 2021 to Today

TL;DR

In five years, NCAA track and field and cross country recruiting changed more than it had in the previous thirty. Name, image and likeness made athletes paid commodities. The transfer portal turned roster-building into a free market. The NCAA dropped its standardized testing requirement. The House settlement capped Division 1 rosters while removing scholarship limits. And the five-in-five eligibility model, adopted in June 2026, resets the clock for everyone. Here are the impacts of each change, in order, and what they mean for a recruit today.

A high school athlete who started getting recruited in 2021 was playing a different game, administratively, than one getting recruited in 2026. The objective hasn't changed, but everything around them has.

Five rule changes have stacked on top of each other over five years, each one rewiring some part of how college programs build rosters and allocate scholarships. Most families never got a clean explanation of any of them, let alone all five together. This is that explanation.

We will go in order because each change set up the next one.

Keeping up with rule changes is one part of getting recruited. To see how it fits with everything else coaches weigh, from your PRs to your grades to where you want to live, start with our complete guide to getting recruited for college track and field.

1. Name, image and likeness (2021)

In July 2021, the NCAA began letting athletes earn money from their name, image and likeness. The shift came as a wave of state laws took effect and just after the Supreme Court's NCAA v. Alston ruling laid bare how vulnerable the NCAA's amateurism model had become.

For the first time, a college athlete could sign an endorsement, run a paid camp, or get paid for a social post without losing eligibility.

For football and basketball, the money was immediate and enormous. For track and field and cross country, NIL mattered less directly and more as the first domino. It established the principle that athletes were assets with market value, and it pointed money toward the sports that generate revenue. Everything that followed, the portal economy and the scholarship restructuring especially, traces back to that shift in how college sports thinks about athletes and dollars.

What NIL meant for a track and field recruit:

NIL didn't mean much, at first. But it started the clock on everything else.

2. The transfer portal goes wide (2021 onward)

The transfer portal existed before 2021, but a string of rule changes blew it wide open. Athletes could transfer once without sitting out a year, and the friction that used to keep rosters relatively stable mostly disappeared.

For track and field, this was the change families felt first. A coach with a roster spot and scholarship money now had a choice: recruit a high school athlete who might develop over two or three years, or bring in a proven college performer from a Division II, U SPORTS, NAIA, or non-Power Division I program who can score next season. More and more, coaches chose the proven option.

That is the squeeze. Every roster spot filled by a transfer is a spot not offered to a high schooler. The portal did not just add a recruiting channel. It started competing directly with high school recruiting for the same finite spots.

What transfer portal changes meant for a track and field recruit:

The bar for getting recruited out of high school went up. You are now competing against college athletes with college results.

3. Standardized testing requirements disappeared (2023)

For decades, a high school athlete's path into Division I or Division II relied partly on a standardized test score. The NCAA used a sliding scale, weighing your SAT or ACT result against your GPA to decide whether you qualified.

That is gone. The NCAA waived testing during the pandemic in 2020, then made the change permanent at its January 2023 Convention, effective for athletes enrolling in 2023-24. Today, a D1 athlete qualifies academically by earning a 2.3 core-course GPA across 16 approved core courses, with no test score required for eligibility at all. We cover what the tests still involve, who should take them anyway, and how to prepare in a dedicated guide: Navigating the SAT and ACT for Student-Athletes.

An important note some families miss: The NCAA dropping the requirement does not mean your target school dropped it. NCAA eligibility and college admissions are two separate gates. An athlete has to clear both. A program's own admissions office may still want an SAT or ACT score, and a number of selective schools have reinstated testing for their applicants even as the NCAA stepped away from it. You can be NCAA-eligible and still fall short of a specific school's admissions bar.

There are test-required, test-optional, and test-blind schools. If an SAT or ACT score is required, you cannot apply without it. At test-optional institutions, your SAT or ACT score can support your application; a strong test score can boost your chances of admission. Test-blind schools will not consider an SAT or ACT score as part of your college application.

Dropping the requirement did not make testing irrelevant, and access is uneven. There are only eight ACT test centres in Canada, four of them in the Greater Toronto Area.

What standardized testing changes meant for a track and field recruit:

There's one fewer hurdle to compete in the NCAA, but not a free pass. If you are targeting academically selective programs, check whether the school itself still needs a test score or if an optional test score could help you. If you're unsure and have time to prepare for and write an SAT or ACT exam, it's still recommended.

4. The House settlement (2025)

This is a big one.

In June 2025, the House v. NCAA settlement was approved, taking effect July 1, 2025. It did two things at once that pull in opposite directions. It eliminated the old sport-specific scholarship limits, so a D1 program can now put a scholarship on every athlete on its roster. And it capped roster sizes, so those rosters got smaller.

For track and field, the new cap is 45 athletes. For cross country, 17. The SEC went further on the men's side, capping men's track at 35 and men's cross country at 10. We break down exactly which programs are affected, the before-and-after numbers, and what it means for recruits and transfers in a dedicated article: How NCAA Roster and Scholarship Rules Changed in 2025.

These caps apply only to Division I programs. No D2 or D3 program has the same restriction on their roster sizes. Division II teams still have the same equivalency-based athletic scholarship structure and Division III teams still do not offer athletic funding (academic only).

However, teams in D2, D3, NAIA, U SPORTS, and even the NJCAA, have all felt the trickle-down effects.

An important note that recruits and parents often miss: A Division I program opting into the settlement does not mean it has an unlimited scholarship budget. The NCAA now lets schools fund as many scholarships as they want, but it didn't hand athletic departments the money to do it. Plenty of D1 track programs now carry a roster limit of 45 and the same department-set budget they had under the old equivalency model, where a capped pool of scholarship money got split into partial awards across the roster however the coaching staff chose.

What capped rosters and uncapped athletic scholarships meant for a track and field recruit:

At the D1 level, and especially within the Power Four conferences, there were immediately fewer total roster spots and fewer developmental opportunities, especially for true freshmen. Coaches began to favor athletes with the highest potential to score right away.

5. The five-in-five eligibility model (adopted 2026)

Updated October 6, 2026. The Division I Cabinet adopted this rule on June 23, 2026. Earlier versions of this section described it as a pending proposal, as ESPN reported before the June vote.

On June 23, 2026, the NCAA Division I Cabinet unanimously adopted an age-based eligibility model, commonly called "five-in-five" or "5-in-5." Athletes get up to five years of competition within a five-year window. The old system gave athletes four seasons of competition within five years. Read the NCAA's announcement of the age-based eligibility model.

What five-in-five means for a track and field recruit

The five-year window starts at whichever comes first: initial full-time college enrollment, or the academic year after the athlete's 19th birthday. The rule removes season-of-competition limits, redshirt rules, and most eligibility extension waivers. The remaining exceptions cover pregnancy, active-duty military service, and official religious missions. The NCAA's Division I age-based eligibility rules page has the full detail.

The rule applies in full to every athlete who first enrolls full time in college in fall 2027 or later. That includes today's high school class of 2027.

Why the class of 2027 felt it first

Athletes who enrolled in fall 2026, and current college athletes with eligibility left, get whichever set of rules gives them more. For many college seniors, that meant one more season. Coaches who expected those athletes to graduate kept them instead, and roster spots planned for high school recruits disappeared. In August 2026, Division I programs told our athletes and our advising team that they had stopped recruiting 2027 sprinters for exactly this reason.

The longer-term effect points the other way. Once the extra-year wave clears, a true freshman arrives with a full, clean five-year window, which can make well-timed high school recruits more attractive than older transfers.

For international athletes, including Canadians, the age-based window matters even more. Athletes who take a gap year, repeat a grade, or enroll later may find their clock starts before they ever set foot on a campus.

What all of this means for recruiting today

Put the five changes together and you get the situation families face.

The transfer portal and the House caps tightened the top of Division I and pushed coaches toward proven, immediate-impact athletes. NIL pointed the sport's money toward revenue programs. Five-in-five squeezed the class of 2027 as college seniors took an extra year, and it should favor clean-timeline high schoolers once that wave clears.

None of that means the opportunities are gone. It means they moved, and the old map no longer matches the territory. For a closer look at how these changes land on families, and why even well-prepared parents get caught off guard, I wrote about it here: NCAA recruiting has been uprooted, and nobody told the families.

A few things have not changed:

• There are more than 1,700 post-secondary institutions offering track and field or cross country across the NCAA, NAIA, U SPORTS, and junior college ranks. The roster spots exist.
• Track and field and cross country operate on verified data. Fast times, far throws, and big leaps will be rewarded. How, when, and where are the variables that have changed, are changing, and will continue to change.

The job for a recruit is no longer learning a fixed set of rules. It is understanding a landscape that keeps moving, and building a target list based on where you could best fit: academically, athletically, by location, and by what your family can afford.

Get 1:1 expert guidance for your recruiting process

These changes are still unfolding, and the programs reacting to them are reacting in real time. That is exactly why a results page or a standards chart can only take a family so far. Knowing whether a specific program has the spot, the money, and a coach who recruits the way you need is a moving target, and it is different for every athlete.

That is the work we do at Streamline Athletes every day. If your family wants help turning all of this into a recruiting plan built around where you fit, book a recruitment advising session with me.

FAQ

What is the biggest recent change to NCAA track and field recruiting?

The House v. NCAA settlement, effective July 2025, capped Division I roster sizes while removing the old scholarship limits. It is the change with the most direct impact on how many high school athletes Division I programs can recruit.

What is the "five-in-five" rule?

It is an NCAA Division I eligibility model, adopted on June 23, 2026, that gives athletes up to five years of competition within a five-year window. The clock starts at initial full-time college enrollment or the academic year following the athlete's 19th birthday, whichever comes first. It applies in full to athletes who first enroll in fall 2027 or later.

How does the transfer portal affect high school recruits?

It increases competition for roster spots. Coaches can fill a spot with a proven college transfer instead of a high school athlete who needs time to develop, which raises the bar for getting recruited directly out of high school, especially at the Power Four level.

Do I still need the SAT or ACT to play NCAA sports?

A standardized test score is not required for NCAA eligibility. The NCAA permanently removed the standardized test requirement in 2023; Division I and Division II eligibility is now based on GPA and core courses. Individual colleges may still require a test score for admission, and some selective schools have reinstated testing for applicants, so check each school's own admissions requirements.

Are there still scholarship opportunities in NCAA track and field?

Yes. The House settlement removed scholarship caps for Division I programs. There are also full and partial scholarship opportunities across Division II, NAIA, and other collegiate athletic associations.

Did NIL change recruiting for track and field athletes?

Indirectly. NIL had the largest direct effect on revenue sports like football and basketball. For track and field, it mattered most as the first step in a broader shift toward treating athletes as assets with market value, which set up the changes that followed.