College sports as we know them have changed dramatically over the last few years. Players can now earn money from their name, image, and likeness, move between programs through the transfer portal and, in some cases, even turn to the courts when NCAA eligibility rules stand in their way. While some programs have benefited massively from these changes, UConn head coach Geno Auriemma isn’t happy about where college sports is heading.

Appearing on Yahoo Sports Daily, Auriemma did not hold back when discussing the current state of college athletics because, for him, college sports is not simply going through a difficult transition.

“College sports is dying. And you know, I’ve had parents pass away. And when they were dying on the inside, they didn’t always show it on the outside. On the outside, sometimes it looks like, ‘Wow, everything’s great.’… On the inside, it’s dying,” Auriemma said on Yahoo Sports Daily. “Because every single day, something comes up to show you a symptom of the disease that we’re suffering.

“I’m not saying, ‘Hey, don’t pay the kids. Hey, don’t let the kids transfer.’ Whatever the case may be. But I think every fan out there, every day, they look at Yahoo! Sports or they pick up any other source of information, and they read about another lawsuit, another coach trying to get away with anything they can, another school trying to do whatever they have to do to win,” he added.

“The more this happens, and the more these things keep being the central focus of the news, the more we’re dying one day at a time. And until somebody comes along and says, ‘This is it, these are the rules, and that’s it.'”

Geno Auriemma believes college sports need the kind of structure it had 25 years ago, when the rules were easier to understand, and the boundaries were clearer. And if you look at some of the recent eligibility chaos around the NCAA, where the Huskies coach is coming from gets easier to understand.

One of the clearest examples came from Alabama basketball center Charles Bediako. Bediako left Alabama for the 2023 NBA Draft. However, he went undrafted and had to spend multiple seasons in the G League.

In the 2025-26 NCAA season, Bediako attempted to return to college basketball. The athletic association denied his eligibility request, and Bediako took a legal path and sued. A court even initially granted a temporary injunction, allowing him to play for the Crimson Tide. His lawsuit was ultimately dismissed after he exhausted his options in state court.

But that was hardly an isolated case.

Behind the NCAA’s five-years-to-play-five-seasons eligibility model, multiple athletes challenged how the rules applied to their individual situations. More than 50 former college basketball players filed a lawsuit against the NCAA seeking another year of eligibility as they argued the new eligibility rules unfairly exclude athletes who graduated high school in 2022.

This issue in college sports is not limited to just basketball, as several other sports are now facing the same.

Then there is the transfer portal.

With NIL now playing a major role in recruiting and roster construction, players have more incentive to explore the market when another program can offer a better fit, more playing time, or a stronger financial opportunity. So players simply pack up and leave whenever they want, making college sports increasingly difficult to manage.

For a coach like Geno Auriemma, those cases are part of the larger problem, where the rules are no longer simply changing; they are being challenged, rewritten, and interpreted through courtrooms.

But his concerns are not limited to money, transfers, or lawsuits. They also extend to the mentality of players in today’s game

“People are treating them differently. So from the time these kids are 12, and they’re really heavy into sports, people treat them like they are god’s gift to the world,” Auriemma further added. “They treat them with baby-like things. ‘They’re so fragile. Don’t break them, don’t hurt their feelings, make sure that they’re okay.’ So they grow up fragile. And then people blame them for being fragile. ‘Hey, kids are different today.’ Yeah, because they’ve been treated different by us – by adults.”

“So my thing is no, they’re not. They’re just as tough as any other kid 25 years ago. You just have to bring it out of them somehow because they want it. They want the same things. At least that’s the way I view it. That’s the kind of kids I get.”

With NIL, the transfer portal, and eligibility battles reshaping college athletics almost daily, Geno Auriemma’s warning may be worth keeping an eye on.