{"id":1015444,"date":"2026-08-21T18:44:17","date_gmt":"2026-08-21T18:44:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/1015444\/"},"modified":"2026-08-21T18:44:17","modified_gmt":"2026-08-21T18:44:17","slug":"federal-appeals-court-halts-ruling-allowing-thousands-of-college-players-extra-year-of-eligibility","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/1015444\/","title":{"rendered":"Federal appeals court halts ruling allowing thousands of college players extra year of eligibility"},"content":{"rendered":"

DENVER (AP) \u2014 A federal appeals court on Friday temporarily halted a court order that would have granted thousands of athletes who left college after last season an extra year of eligibility<\/a> \u2014 a key ruling that came only eight days before football season\u2019s opening kickoff.<\/p>\n

The lawsuit was filed by players who graduated high school in 2022, whose college eligibility ended last season and who were not included in the NCAA\u2019s controversial new rule<\/a> that grants most players five years of eligibility beginning next season.<\/p>\n

After winning a ruling in district court<\/a> last month, many of those players were trying to figure out how to return to their former schools to play another year. TCU and North Carolina play in Dublin next Saturday, one of eight games on the opening day schedule for major college football.<\/p>\n

This 2-1 ruling from a panel of the U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver puts that on hold until the appeal can be heard in total. It could \u2014 but is not guaranteed to \u2014 tamp down the chaos from a series of rulings in courts around the country that had cleared the way for players in multiple sports to come back. The NCAA includes some 1,200 member schools and nearly a half-million athletes in all.<\/p>\n

A big portion of the case rests on the idea that, with the fall season bearing down, some athletes were trying to regain spots on rosters that had already been locked in. The plaintiffs argued it was a matter of fairness: They shouldn\u2019t be restricted from a fifth year \u2014 and the educational and NIL compensation opportunities that go along with it \u2014 that a player one year younger was entitled to.<\/p>\n

But, the NCAA countered in its legal filing, \u201cfairness is in the eye of the beholder.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cCountless student-athletes already on campuses, and schools who built their rosters in reliance on the rules the NCAA\u2019s membership wrote and agreed to follow, do not believe it is fair for thousands of formerly-ineligible athletes to return to competition at the start of the 2026\u201327 season,\u201d it said. <\/p>\n

The NCAA\u2019s chief legal officer, Scott Bearby, sent a memo to schools telling them they would not be subject to NCAA punishment \u201cfor any class members who were allowed to compete consistent with the scope of the Wisne injunction prior to the stay being granted.\u201d<\/p>\n

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But, he reiterated, those players are no longer eligible.<\/p>\n

Among them were defensive linemen Kellan Wyatt<\/a> and Stephan Daley, both members of the national championship team at Indiana last season.<\/p>\n

Bearby also acknowledged that the NCAA would continue to defend similar lawsuits the association is losing in state courts around the country \u2014 a signal that the NCAA knows Friday\u2019s ruling is not a guarantee to end the confusion created because of the new eligibility rule. More appeals are possible, even likely. <\/p>\n

Making headlines this week was the return of former Ole Miss starters Dae\u2019Quan Wright<\/a>, Zxavian Harris and Wydett Williams, who won rulings from a state court in Louisiana giving them another season of eligibility even though they\u2019d signed with NFL teams this summer. <\/p>\n

Basketball teams have longer to figure this out \u2014 no team wants a player on the roster who might later be declared ineligible. Gonzaga, for one, recently added Dayton\u2019s Javon Bennett and Florida State\u2019s Chauncey Wiggins, each of whom won eligibility lawsuits in different courts. <\/p>\n

\u201cSome of us coaches told the NCAA over and over again, if they waited longer to announce this, they probably wouldn\u2019t have this issue,\u201d Zags coach Mark Few said in a recent interview<\/a>. \u201cSo I don\u2019t know why anybody would not be open to it. Maybe you don\u2019t need it, but if you do … these are good guys.\u201d <\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

Sign up for Top 25 poll alerts here<\/a>. Visit the Top 25 here<\/a> and see AP\u2019s full college football coverage here.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"DENVER (AP) \u2014 A federal appeals court on Friday temporarily halted a court order that would have granted…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1015445,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[10],"tags":[1428,1369,356,315255,45205,1318,57,3102,406284,406280,336,362,353,323544,3060,406282,62,406281,61,67,132,68,406283],"class_list":["post-1015444","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-college-football","tag-college-sports","tag-courts","tag-daequan-wright","tag-dayton","tag-football","tag-general-news","tag-high-school-sports","tag-javon-bennett","tag-kellan-wyatt","tag-lawsuits","tag-legal-proceedings","tag-louisiana","tag-mark-few","tag-schools","tag-scott-bearby","tag-sports","tag-stephan-daley","tag-u-s-news","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us","tag-zxavian-harris"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/117134981138781595","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1015444","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1015444"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1015444\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1015445"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1015444"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1015444"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1015444"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}