Chuck Neinas, the visionary college athletics administrator who held leadership roles with the Big Eight Conference, Big 12 Conference, College Football Association (CFA), and the NCAA, passed away Dec. 16. He was 93.
"Chuck Neinas, first in the NCAA and later as Commissioner of the Big Eight Conference, was a brilliant college administrator and then, as executive director of the College Football Association (CFA), he revolutionized the way we watch college football today.
His CFA-inspired lawsuit (Georgia-Oklahoma) opened up the airwaves in a famous antitrust lawsuit that stripped the NCAA's power to limit the games available on television/cable each week.
Imagine maybe three or four games on television a week across the country to what we have now. Chuck was a controversial pioneer in his efforts to give college football fans the right to see the sport when they weren't in attendance and the popularity of the sport exploded."
– Steve Richardson, on behalf of the FWAA.