Mental health is a kind of emotional state, a good psychological state can have a positive impact on a person, physical exercise can have a positive impact on the psychological state of college students, prevent the generation of negative emotions, improve the bad emotional state, and then promote the mental health of college students. Health is an inevitable requirement to promote the all-round development of people and a basic condition for economic and social development. Health education should be incorporated into the national education system to promote the national health of the people through sports. Young people are the main force and backbone of national and social development. In order to realize the Chinese dream of great rejuvenation, we must attach importance to the development of young people and the physical and mental health of young people. In the process of compulsory education, middle school and high school period is a key stage in the gradual formation and development of students' psychology and body, but due to the large audience of China's education, the competition is more intense, which inevitably causes a lot of students to focus on exam-oriented education and neglect physical health, especially in recent years, the mental health issues of increasing concern. Through the research situation of mental health in China and the concept of mental health quality, this paper analyzes the problems of sports and mental health, and puts forward some corresponding suggestions for the problems, which has reference significance for promoting students' mental health.