Key Highlights
- EA Sports will not be making a college basketball game after all.
- This move comes in response to 2K Games being favored by most colleges.
- This is not exactly the outcome fans might have wanted.
Electronic Arts’ dreams of building a college basketball game seems to have been cut short, as per recent reports – which also mention the ball having entered 2K Games’ court instead, this time around.
In a rather intriguing tale, 2K Games’ sheer presence has seemingly stopped EA dead in its tracks – for now, anyway. In fact, EA has completely taken away the licensing offer, which is really quite unfortunate.
Electronic Arts Rescinds Its College Basketball Video Game Proposal
Following the surprisingly warm reception toward EA Sports College Football 26, publisher Electronic Arts Sports (EA Sports) had presented its grand plan of dominating the college basketball video game market, in a rather cryptic Twitter/X post back in June, 2025.
Bring the Madness. Let’s run it back. #CBB #ItsInTheGame pic.twitter.com/iBNhGxn2yj
— EA SPORTS (@EASPORTS) June 30, 2025
Since then, EA Sports has been in touch with multiple schools across the US, attempting to gain licensing rights to their college basketball game. However, as per Matt Brown of Extra Points, that deal has been rescinded entirely.
This was confirmed in a rather long letter sent to licensing directors across the campus and conference levels. The contents of the letter clearly expressed disappointment, and mentioned parting ways, at least for now.
EA Sports is yet to make a public statement on the same, but we can expect one soon. Their decision to pull out of the basketball game series is nothing short of disappointing, but is entirely understandable, given that a majority of these schools have chosen to accept 2K Games’ proposal instead.
This was confirmed by EA Sports’ own commercial partnerships Vice President, Sean O’ Brien on September 3, 2025 (the same day as the initial report), along with a X post by 2K. In a nutshell, 2K Games will incorporate the college basketball experience into the already existing NBA 2K series, which is not exactly good news for a lot of players.
We’re going back to school. pic.twitter.com/8u1ihv5i3s
— 2K (@2K) September 5, 2025
It’s a real shame, given how passionate Electronic Arts was about the whole thing. EA Sports really wanted to bank on the success of College Football 26, and expand its horizons (so to speak) but given how many colleges have already accepted 2k Games’ proposal over theirs, it was quite a pointless battle.
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As such, it makes total sense why EA Sports decided to pull back from the race – there was simply no point in competing against an opponent who would win regardless. This also marks the end of EA Sports’ College Basketball dream, with the last title being NCAA Basketball 10 – released back in November, 2009.
2K Games Victory Might Be the Worst Possible Outcome
2K’s victory might just be one of the worst things to happen to college basketball games. After all, 2K is planning to incorporate college basketball into its already existing NBA 2K franchise, as a separate add-on or DLC – as opposed to a full, separate game from EA Sports.
Despite having worked on basketball games for the good portion of the last decade, player faith in 2K Games remains shaky at best still, and this move might serve to further alienate players. More so when we consider that 2K Games has a very bad history with DLCs, cosmetics, and their pricing.
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Furthermore, content appears to be scaled back a lot more in comparison to EA Sports’ proposal, with only over 100 college programs being taken into consideration – less than a third of the expected numbers.
However, College Hoops 2008 remains as one of the better NBA college basketball games out there, and here’s hoping that 2K still has some of that magic left over, which they can translate to the new game modes.
