The sports video game genre is filled with options for fans of basically all major sports. There are golf games, football games, pro basketball games, soccer games, hockey games, and games for tennis, fighting (UFC, for example), baseball, and pretty much everything else. If it’s a professional sport, there’s probably a game for it that represents that sport’s league. There’s even, thanks to a lengthy effort, a college football game. College football has unique intricacies that set it apart from the NFL, somewhat justifying the existence of the two. One that is actually not represented whatsoever, though, is college basketball. Not anymore, anyway.
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The last time there was a college basketball video game was NCAA Basketball 10 in 2009, so it’s been much longer than the gap between NCAA Football 14 and EA Sports College Football 25. After the massive success the game ended up being, EA decided to bring back the college basketball series in another important revival. Unfortunately, they’ve just backed out of that plan, and that’s a major loss for the genre and perhaps for gaming as a whole.
EA Sports’ College Basketball Game No Longer Happening Deserves Mourning
By no means is EA Sports a phenomenal developer. Look at the recent history of Madden for plenty of examples. They tend to phone it in every year and make cash grabs that only slightly upgrade and change rosters from the prior year’s version. But College Football 25 was different. The 2026 version is not quite as good, but it’s still very clear that EA does care about college sports, at least in the first game reviving the series.
It’s fair to assume that the same would’ve been evident for any EA college basketball game. That’s a pretty substantial loss, even if the sports genre is majorly oversaturated with yearly releases (which this probably would’ve been) that feature microtransactions, but it would’ve at least filled a niche in the genre that’s currently untouched. March Madness is so special, and to be able to experience it and try to have one’s own Cinderella run would’ve been incredible in a video game, but it probably isn’t happening anymore.
College Basketball Remains a Hole in the Sports Genre
According to a report, EA Sports is pulling out of its planned game because some colleges had decided to work with rival 2K Sports in an NBA game. That ultimately means that there will be a select few universities represented as part of the MyCAREER mode in NBA 2K27 and future iterations, but there will be no college basketball video game. The other programs, both small and unheralded, as well as the big ones that don’t make the final 2K cut, just get left out in the cold entirely.
Unfortunately, based on EA vice president Sean O’Brien’s comments, it just appears as if this game is dead in the water. Because those schools are working with 2K Sports, there just won’t be a game at all. Not one without those schools, because O’Brien wanted to try to “bring a standalone college basketball game with all men’s and women’s Division 1 institutions and student athletes, conferences as well as the NCAA.” It was all or nothing for EA, and now, it’s nothing, leaving a hole that just won’t be filled.
Why EA Should Reconsider Its Stance
EA Sports is being a little bit petty. Understandably, they don’t want to work with 2K Sports, being that they’re the other major sports game developer, but there’s not much crossover there in general. They don’t really compete like that because 2K Sports handles golf, basketball, and WWE. EA, on the other hand, runs football, soccer, hockey, and UFC. They don’t directly compete within those areas, especially since NBA Live ended years ago.
There doesn’t have to be exclusivity, either. There’s not a recent precedent for this, but there’s no reason the two sides can’t just agree to use the same schools. NBA 2K is not going to be threatened by a college basketball game because they remain very different styles of the same sport. The inverse is true for EA Sports’ college franchise because it brings things to the table you just can’t get from 2K.
EA is playing hardball here in what appears to be an attempt to make 2K Sports lose out, but they’re not going to. The schools agreed to it, so the only losers here are EA and college basketball fans. EA Sports is self-sabotaging now, and there’s really no valid excuse for it. Unfortunately, we’re all worse off (and this is coming from someone who thinks sports video games are not good for the gaming industry) because of it.
What do you think? Are you mourning the loss of this college basketball series that won’t be? Let us know below!