https://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/35812605/athletes-sue-ivy-league-no-scholarship-policy

Some former athletes of Ivy League schools are suing claiming that by not offering scholarships amounts to a price-fixing agreement that denies athletes proper financial aid and payment for their services. We all know Drake and the PFL do not offer scholarships for football.

Too early to say if this will go anywhere, but if it does go anywhere there could be some effects on Drake & the PFL.

I have mixed feelings about this. Part of me says they knew the Ivy League rules when signing up, so why are they complaining now. If they did not like the scholarship rules no one forced them to attend an Ivy League school. The other part of me never understood how the Ivy League got away with being NCAA Division I by side stepping the NCAA Division I scholarship quotas in all sports. 

Drake is following the NCAA Division I scholarship rules for football, so I do not believe it will impact anything. FCS schools can give anywhere from 0-63 scholarships and they can be partial (i.e. 1/4, 1/2, 1/3, or full). FBS is required to give 85 full scholarships. 

If I were Drake I would find a way to offer the 63 scholarships for other reasons, but it will never happen. With the current model football helps increase Drake's male population which actually helps the percentage for Title IX purposes in all sports and there is no way Drake could offer 102 women's scholarships to balance out the 63 football scholarships. Even with over 100 football males the Drake's population is only 38% male.

How are FBS schools allowed to sidestep the Title IX rule for scholarship numbers?  Does a school like Iowa or Nebraska really have that many women's scholarship opportunities by sport that are equal to the men?

Title IX is not just a 50/50 split. It goes by male to female ratios which both Iowa (44% male to 56% female) and Nebraska (50% male and 50% female) have a more even split than Drake. Iowa sponsors 8 mens and 14 womens sports at the NCAA DI level. Three of those mens sports are cross country, indoor track, and outdoor track which share split scholarships. Another is golf which is only 4.5 scholarships. Nebraska offers 10 mens sports and 14 womens sports at the NCAA DI level. Because they have a 50/50 split there is less of a discrepancy in the number of sports; however, most of the male sports (other than football) are still are ones with low scholarship limits to balance out football. 

Also, most womens sports have larger scholarship limits their men counterparts. For example, mens basketball has 13 scholarships compared to 15 for womens basketball. Womens gymnastics have 12 scholarships and mens gymnastics have half the amount, etc.