With calls for revolutionary change to the financial structure of college sports growing louder, the NCAA made an announcement: Let them eat unlimited snacks.
The NCAA's legislative council approved a rule change on Tuesday that would allow Division I student athletes, both scholarship athletes and walk-ons, to receive unlimited meals and snacks. The proposed rule change to the meal allowances of student athletes still needs to be approved by the Division I Board of Directors on April 24 and then would take effect on August 1.
Here are the details on the proposed rule change as available at NCAA.com:
Division I student-athletes can receive unlimited meals and snacks in conjunction with their athletics participation, the Legislative Council decided Tuesday. The rule, which applies to walk-ons as well as scholarship student-athletes, is an effort to meet the nutritional needs of all student-athletes.
The provision of meals approved today is in addition to the meal plan provided as part of a full scholarship. Prior to this change, scholarship student-athletes received three meals a day or a food stipend.
This proposal was one of the so-called "Well-Being Rules" approved by the NCAA's legislative council on Tuesday. Other proposed rule changes relate to testing positive for street drugs during championships as well as required rest time between preseason football practices.
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The problem of limited food and snacks for student athletes generated headlines during the 2014 NCAA Tournament when UConn's Shabazz Napier talked to reporters about going to bed hungry.
"As student athletes we get utilized for what we do so well. We're definitely blessed to get a scholarship to our universities but at the end of the day that doesn't cover everything. We do have hungry nights when we don't have enough money to get food," Napier told a group of reporters in March while discussing the unionization efforts of Northwestern football players. The 22-year-old point guard who would soon be named the Most Outstanding Player of the Final Four added in that conversation, "I don't think student athletes should get hundreds of thousands of dollars, but, like I said, there are hungry nights that I go to bed and I'm starving."