College Sports System Credited for Olympic and Paralympic Successes

The importance of the collegiate sports system within the U.S. Olympic movement was again emphasized during a panel discussion at the NCAA Convention in Nashville.

The livestreamed panel “Paris 2024: The NCAA Impact at the Olympic and Paralympic Games” touched on the impact of college sports on the Games. More than 1,200 former, current and incoming college athletes competed for over 120 countries.

Rocky Harris, United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee chief of sport and athlete services, said 231 schools had at least one Olympic or Paralympic athlete this summer. Sixty-five percent of the U.S. Olympic team had ties to an NCAA championship or emerging sport.

“It was our most successful Games on the medal table in a non-home Games,” Harris said. “We know a big part of that is the collegiate system. The collegiate system drives our model.”

Harris pointed out how the Olympic and Paralympic Games had the college system powering not only Team USA but other countries with 800 international athletes who have an NCAA background. He also referenced the current collegiate system turmoil, admitting “certain sports, they are at risk. We have significant concern for the future of Team USA because of it.”

One of those sports is men’s gymnastics. The USA Gymnastics men’s national team is made up entirely of athletes either in or from the collegiate space, said USA Gymnastics President and Chief Executive Officer Li Li Leung, who added that a significant part of the women’s team currently competes collegiately.

“The collegiate system is essentially our secret sauce on the international stage,” Leung said. “We are the envy of the rest of the world in terms of infrastructure that we have in place for athletes to be able to compete on the international level. … Without the NCAA programs, we would not have a pipeline on the international stage.”

Knowing the risk of men’s gymnastics collegiately, Leung said the national governing body is working to grow the sport’s reach and “we remain flexible and committed to working out creative ideals and solutions to thrive within this space that we know is uncertain.”

The panel had two athletes on it, U.S. para shot put gold medalist Noelle Malkamaki from DePaul and fencer Nick Itkin of Notre Dame. Itkin said the college system has educated him on being part of a team compared to growing up and competing individually while Malkamaki said “without the NCAA I would never have become a professional athlete in the first place because I wouldn’t have known about” the ability to compete as a Paralympian.

Those stories are what some of NBC Sports worked to amplify more before the Paris Games, said Ron Vaccaro, vice president of editorial for NBC Sports.

“We always wanted to be in our storytelling relatable,” Vaccaro said. “We always had the college aspect to it but we made it much more purposeful this time. … I think the thing we were delighted by the most was it really was a rallying point.”