Current and former student-athletes have sued the NCAA in a new proposed class action over rules that restrict player eligibility.
As reported by Reuters, 10 plaintiffs claim in their lawsuit filed Tuesday in federal court in Nashville that the NCAA's rules cut short their opportunity to play college sports and suppressed their potential commercial opportunities. They are seeking to represent thousands of players.
Under current NCAA rules, athletes are elligible to compete in four seasons within a five-year window. Some athletes are granted a “redshirt” year, in which they play a limited amount while preserving four full seasons of eligibility.
Per the reporting of Mike Scarcella, the lawsuit said the rules violate federal antitrust law by prohibiting athletes who forgo a redshirt year from competing fully within the five-year window.
“Athletes have five years to practice and five years to graduate. They should have five years to play,” the lawsuit said, as reported by Reuters.
The NCAA said in a statement said that its eligibility rules "enable student-athletes to access the life-changing opportunity to be a student-athlete."
The NCAA has faced a growing number of cases from individual players who are challenging decisions curtailing their eligibility. The new lawsuit is the first seeking class action status over the "redshirt" rule, Scarcella reported.
The case is Langston Patterson et al v. National Collegiate Athletic Association.
The plaintiffs, which include two Vanderbilt University football players, are not challenging the NCAA’s power to define an eligibility window, but instead the cap on the number of competitive seasons within that timeframe.
The lawsuit seeks “to halt the NCAA’s unjustified and anticompetitive restrictions, to restore fair competition among universities, and to protect the economic opportunities of Division I college athletes.”
