Here are the AI-powered tools athletic departments are using to save time, reduce burnout, and operate more efficiently.

January 6, 2025

College athletics never slows down.

Even when staff sizes hold steady, expectations continue to rise – more platforms, longer seasons, faster turnaround, and an ever-growing appetite for content and connection.

That reality has pushed athletic departments to rethink how work gets done. And increasingly, the answer isn’t working harder – it’s working smarter.

That’s where artificial intelligence enters the picture.

As Mark Cuban recently wrote on X, AI doesn’t make uncreative people creative. It allows creators who already know their craft to become exponentially more effective. Iteration that once took hours or days can now happen in minutes. Ideas that were previously sidelined due to time, cost, or complexity are suddenly within reach.

Perhaps most importantly, AI lowers the cost of experimentation.

In a world where most content never becomes a finished product – and learning happens through iteration – AI removes friction from the creative process. Fewer barriers. Fewer delays. More room to test, refine, and improve.

What it doesn’t do is take control away from the creator.

AI doesn’t publish anything.

AI doesn’t decide what’s worth sharing.

AI doesn’t replace judgment, voice, or context.

As Cuban notes, creators still maintain full ownership of the final product. AI simply becomes another tool – alongside search engines, design software, and collaboration – that supports how great work gets made.

With that lens, the conversation around AI in college athletics shifts from fear to opportunity.

Below are some of the AI tools worth keeping an eye on in 2026, what they do well, and how they can support athletic departments across the NCAA, NAIA, NJCAA, and beyond.

We’ve separated them into two categories.

AI-Forward Tools for College Athletics

Platforms where AI is central to the product, fundamentally transforming a process, service, or software experience.

Hudl

Best for:  Video analysis & player development
Who it helps:  Coaches, analysts, video staff, athletes
AI application: Hudl uses AI to automate film breakdown, tag actions, identify patterns, and surface insights instantly. Coaches spend less time manually clipping and more time teaching. Hudl’s tools are amongst the most widely-adopted solutions in sports.

Why departments use it:

• Faster film analysis
• Better practice planning
• Instant tendencies & insights
• Scales easily across multiple sports

WSC Sports

Best for:  Automated video highlight creation & content personalization
Who it helps:  SIDs, social media/content teams, digital media directors, fan engagement teams
AI application: WSC Sports uses advanced AI to automatically ingest live game video, identify key moments (scores, big plays, notable events), and produce fan-ready clips in real time – often within minutes of the action happening. It also supports smart content indexing and multi-format delivery (vertical for social, widescreen for web/TV, etc.), helping departments scale video output dramatically without adding staff time

Why departments use it:

• Video remains one of the primary drivers of fan engagement in college athletics.
• Automated tools save hours of editing time per game.
• Teams can scale content output across all sports.
• Supports multi-platform publishing and fan personalization.

ShotTracker (for basketball)

Best for:  Real-time basketball analytics
Who it helps:  Coaches, scouts, analysts, content teams
AI application: ShotTracker delivers real-time, sensor-based basketball data – lineup efficiencies, shot charts, ball movement, heat maps, and more. It enhances coaching insight and provides rich data for front office executives

Why departments use it:

• True real-time insights
• Zero manual stat entry
• Better scouting & player development
• Data-rich content opportunities

Pixellot

Best for:  Automated streaming & highlight creation
Who it helps:  SIDs, video teams, fans, coaches
AI application: Pixellot’s AI-powered cameras automatically track the action, stream games, and generate highlights without a human operator. It makes full athletic department coverage more realistic, especially for “non-revenue” sports. It also allows for automated multi-view technology at the NCAA Division 1 level for instant replay.

Why departments use it:

• Covers more sports with fewer staff
• Instant highlights for social/content
• Better streaming consistency
• Increased exposure for all teams

FanWord

Best for:  Streamlining written, digital content like game recaps, feature stories, and player bios
Who it helps:  SIDs, communications, PR, media relations, marketing, fundraising
AI application: FanWord Assist is a purpose-built AI platform designed specifically for the storytelling needs of college athletics. It primarily helps communication teams write game recaps, player bios, feature stories, and other digital content more efficiently. Its custom-trained and proprietary AI is designed to serve athletic departments at every level of college sports. Additional tools, such as AI-powered transcriptions and online interviews, help staff streamline each part of the content creation process.

Why departments use it:

• Cuts writing time each week by hours
• Expands coverage to all sports
• Ensures clean, consistent editorial voice
• Supports schools and staffs at all sizes
• Helps departments tell more and better stories

AI-Supportive Tools for College Athletics

Platforms that incorporate AI into specific features or workflows to enhance efficiency and insights, without making AI the core driver of the product.

Greenfly

Best for:  Media delivery, AI tagging
Who it helps:  SIDs, photographers, athletes, marketing, partners
AI application: Greenfly’s AI Vision automatically tags photos and videos by athlete, moment type, and even sponsor marks. It streamlines how content flows to athletes, teams, and partners – ideal for NIL and high-volume media operations.

Why departments use it:

• Automatic photo/video tagging
• Faster distribution workflows
• Enhances sponsor deliverables
• Centralizes assets for all sports

Catapult

Best for:  Elite performance tracking, analytics & video solutions
Who it helps:  Athletic departments, coaching staffs, performance teams, strength & conditioning pro
AI application: Catapult operates at the intersection of sports science and technology to help teams and athletes maximize performance, reduce injury risk, and drive better decision‑making. Their platform combines wearable athlete monitoring, advanced analytics, video integration, and recruiting/scouting tools used by thousands of pro and college programs worldwide.

Why departments use it:

• Tracks physical performance metrics with wearable tech to optimize training and reduce injury risk
• Connects video analysis with data for faster game prep and tactical insight
• Supports recruiting and scouting workflows with unified analytics
• Real‑time solutions available on game day for instant decision support
• Trusted by thousands of teams across pro and collegiate sports around the world

Box Out Sports

Best for:  Graphics and social captions
Who it helps:  SIDs, creative teams, student workers
AI application: Box Out lets departments create polished, on-brand graphics in minutes. With its AI caption suggestions, users get multiple ready-to-post social captions tailored to the content they create.

Why departments use it:

• AI-generated captions save time
• Huge library of templates
• Easy for non-designers
• Consistent branding across teams

Gipper

Best for:  Graphics and engagement
Who it helps:  Marketing staff, social media teams, communications professionals
AI application: Gipper Engage provides the ability for departments to generate branded social media content/digital newsletters and use AI functionality to remove backgrounds. It complements written storytelling tools with rich visual content.

Why departments use it:

• Easy creation of social graphics
• Supports NIL and recruitment content
• Reduces time spent on routine design tasks
• Improves fan engagement

Teamworks

Best for:  Operations, communication, and athlete management
Who it helps:  Coaches, ops, sports med, academics, entire departments
AI application: Teamworks is the industry-leading organizational hub in sports, serving more than 6,500 elite sports teams globally. Through its vast suite of products, the company helps athletic organizations with scheduling, compliance, communication, forms, travel, academics, and more. The company recently closed a Series F to accelerate AI-powered innovation. Teamworks Intelligence, the company’s sports analytics solution, uses advanced machine learning to to create predictive models and metrics for various departments.

Why departments use it:

• Help organizations make smarter, data-backed decisions
• Improve team & individual performance
• Reducing maintenance costs
• Uncover undervalued talent

Opendorse

Best for:  Athlete marketing, NIL marketplace/education/management
Who it helps:  Athletic directors, NIL coordinators, general managers, student-athletes
AI application: Similar to Teamworks, Hudl, and other companies on this list, Opendorse offers a wide variety of solutions for the college sports industry to support schools, athletes, brands, and other stakeholders in the NIL space. The company uses AI-powered Smart Athlete Matching to match athletes with sponsorship opportunities and guide personal branding strategies.

Why departments use it:

• Matches athletes with relevant partners
• Streamlines NIL workflow
• Expands personal visibility
• Supports athlete marketing and fan engagement

Final Thoughts

AI isn’t about automating people out of the process – it’s about equipping them with tools that reduce burnout, improve quality, and increase capacity.

Whether you’re looking to streamline operations, enhance film study, boost social content, manage media more efficiently, or scale storytelling across every sport, these AI tools are helping athletic departments at every level work smarter, faster, and with a higher standard.