Thoughts of the Day: June 25, 2026

Florida AD Scott Stricklin oversaw an athletic program that finished sixth nationally (Photo by Chris Spears)

A few thoughts to jump start your Thursday morning:

For the 42^nd  consecutive year, the University of Florida finished among the top ten in the Learfield Director’s Cup standings that signify overall excellence from top to bottom of the entire athletic program. A strong second place finish by the Florida women’s track and field team at the NCAA outdoor championships pushed Florida into sixth in the Learfield standings, just nine points ahead of Southern Cal and 23 ahead of Georgia.

What makes this finish remarkable is the Gators did it without winning a single national championship, ending a streak of 16 consecutive years in which Florida had at least one team bring home the big trophy. This was a year in which the Gators could have very well won the Director’s Cup championship. Texas, for the second straight year won the title, this year with 1,322 points. The Longhorns had three national championships. Without the benefit of a single national title, the Gators finished 217.5 points behind Texas. That is ground that could have been made up with a few stronger finishes in NCAA tournaments. Men’s basketball didn’t make it out of the second round of the NCAA Tournament. Gymnastics finished third, men’s golf finished in a fifth-place tie, softball lost in the super regionals, baseball didn’t make it out of the regional and lacrosse lost in the second round.

Learfield Directors Cup top 25 (SEC schools in bold face): 1. Texas 1,322; 2. Stanford 1,263.5; 3. UCLA 1,199.25; 4. North Carolina; 1,166.75 5. Virginia 1,148.75; 6. FLORIDA 1,104.5; 7. Southern California 1,095.5; 8. Georgia 1,081.25; 9. Michigan 1,067.75; 10. Ohio State 1,071.25; 11. Duke 1,039.25; 12. Texas A&M 980; 13. Alabama 968.75; 14. Arkansas 965.75; 15. Tennessee 964.75; 16. Oklahoma 930.75; 17. Nebraska 929; 18. LSU 926.75; 19. Notre Dame 898.5; 20. Princeton 878.5; 21. Penn State 864.5; 22. North Carolina State 860; 23. Oregon 783; 24. Wisconsin 754; 25. BYU 730; other SEC schools and schools of interest in the top 50: 26. Auburn 724.5; 27. Kentucky 716.5; 34. Ole Miss 672.25; 40. Vanderbilt 628.25; 41. Florida State 604; 44. South Carolina 598.5; 57. Miami 452

SOFTBALL TRANSFER ALERT: PICKENS TWINS AVAILABLE

The Pickens twins are in the NCAA softball transfer portal – All-American outfielder Madsion Pickens, who spent the last two seasons at Louisville, and middle infielder Mackenzie Pickens, who played the last two seasons at Ole Miss. There is no indication where the Pickens twins are leaning to at this point, but Florida might have a shot at them since they were high school teammates with pitcher Caroline Stanton at Buford (GA) High School. Stanton enrolled early at Florida back in January but took a redshirt season to prevent injury since Georgia plays softball in the fall months.

At Louisville, Madison Pickens hit 11 home runs and drove in 74 RBI while hitting .456 in 2026. In her two year career she hit .368 with 14 home runs and 99 RBI. At Ole Miss, Mackenzie Pickens, hit .271 last season with 11 home runs and 43 RBI. For her two-year career she hit .300 with 18 home runs and 78 RBI.

ONE FINAL PITHY THOUGHT: Einstein is often attributed with the quote “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”  Scholars and biographers are of consensus opinion that Einstein never said it. Nobody debates the veracity of the statement, only who actually said it first.

Perhaps it was a Nostradamus moment for the genius who first coined that phrase because in the learning lab that is life its own self we have an ongoing Exhibit A: the NCAA, which, in its infinite wisdom, spends half its existence in court rooms where it typically gets clobbered. For aspiring attorneys wishing to make a name for themselves in the field of sports, no one provides more billable hours than the NCAA, whose newest rules about eligibility and age are about to be challenged in multiple jurisdictions.

The new rules are well intentioned and designed to put up guardrails that will keep college sports from spiraling out of control. Everybody agrees that allowing five years eligibility over a five-year period that begins with graduation from high school is a nice first step. Everybody agrees that these inconsistent NCAA eligibility waivers should be abolished along with the silliness of different redshirt rules for every sport. Everybody agrees that it is ridiculous for college age kids to have to compete against grown men in their mid-to-late 20s who have spent years playing professional basketball whether in the US or internationally.

The new rules, which go into effect immediately, grant five years eligibility to athletes who fit into the 19-to-24 age bracket but deny a fifth year to those who completed their fourth year during the 2025-26 athletic calendar year. So, someone who was a third-year junior last year, has two more years of eligibility but someone who finished his fourth year is kicked to the curb. That inconsistency alone is about to trigger hundreds of lawsuits that the NCAA is almost certain to lose. The NCAA can argue until the cows come home that it has a right to make and enforce its own rules, but inconsistency and precedent says they will once again get torched on legalities.

For example, how can the NCAA grant a seventh year for Kentucky basketball transfer Franck Kepnang? A 6-11 center originally from Senegal, Kepnang has played 111 college basketball games in six seasons, two at Oregon and four at Washington. He will be 25 years old before the basketball season begins in November. Under the new rules he should be ineligible based on six previous seasons and age, but the NCAA gave him a waiver to play. The new rules eliminate waivers but Kepnang was granted a waiver and if the NCAA renegs on its ruling Kepnang will hang the organization in court.

That Kepnang has been ruled eligible should be good news for Denzel Aberdeen, who has petitioned the NCAA for a waiver that will grant him a fifth season at the University of Florida. How can the NCAA grant Kepnang a seventh year and deny Aberdeen, who is only a few credit hours from his college degree, a fifth year? If common sense comes into play, this will be an easy decision but whoever said common sense factors in NCAA rulings?

Set this in stone: Denzel Aberdeen will be playing for the Gators this coming year. The only question is who grants his eligibility – the NCAA or the courts. If the NCAA denies the waiver, Denzel will take his case before a friendly local judge who will note the NCAA’s record of inconsistency and favoritism when he issues a restraining order that will allow year five.

The new rules should also effect Florida’s Urban Klavzar, who came to UF from Slovenia where he was playing for a professional team. The NCAA, in its infinite wisdom, took a year of eligibility away from Klavzar when he arrived in Gainesville. He’s a senior this year, but under the new rules he should be eligible for a fourth season in 2027-28.

Another Gator who likely has a case that needs to go to court is AJ Brown, who received a medical redshirt in 2023-24 at Ohio University and took a redshirt at Florida last season while rehabbing a bad shoulder. This will be his fifth season of college basketball so based on the new rules, it will be his last. But, if the NCAA is ruling that Kepnang gets a pass for three injury-filled seasons at Washington in which he played a combined 32 games, it seems logical that Brown should have two seasons remaining, not one.

Logic says the cases for Aberdeen, Klavzar and AJ Brown should be decided favorably for the Gators, but there will be hundreds of challenges, most of them filed within the next week or so. Prior to Wednesday’s ruling, sports attorney Darren Heitner, whose undergraduate and law degrees were earned at the University of Florida, had something like 55 clients ready to challenge the NCAA in court.  Per a post by Jon Rothstein on X, Heitner picked up an additional 20 players whose high school graduation year was 2022.

In a lawsuit brought against the NCAA in Ohio on behalf of players who spent four years playing without the benefit of a redshirt, Ohio, attorneys Ryan Downton and Charles Rittgers stated, “Rather, they challenge the NCAA's application of the rule that allows players they competed against from the high school class of 2017-20 and 2023-25 an additional year of competition while denying plaintiffs the same opportunity … The NCAA then compounded the problem by allowing former professional players to compete in their fifth year following high school graduation regardless of the number of professional games they had played, while denying plaintiffs the same opportunity for a fifth year of competition.”

The NCAA Division I Cabinet’s justification: “Student-athletes who will exhaust their eligibility this year have received the full period of eligibility permitted by NCAA bylaws and the life-changing benefits college sports provides. Giving those student-athletes another season would destabilize rosters just ahead of the coming season by disrupting settled expectations of countless student-athletes regarding their expected roster spots and playing time next year, including incoming freshmen who are eager to participate in the life-changing experience of college athletics.”

This is a brand new case about brand new rules, but essentially, it’s the same thing being done over and again by the NCAA. In other words, more insanity.