{"id":710437,"date":"2026-04-07T06:37:15","date_gmt":"2026-04-07T06:37:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/710437\/"},"modified":"2026-04-07T06:37:15","modified_gmt":"2026-04-07T06:37:15","slug":"ncaa-files-response-to-ou-linebacker-owen-heineckes-lawsuit-seeking-6th-year-of-eligibility","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/710437\/","title":{"rendered":"NCAA files response to OU linebacker Owen Heinecke’s lawsuit seeking 6th year of eligibility"},"content":{"rendered":"

The NCAA on Monday filed its response in Cleveland County District Court to Owen Heinecke’s motion for a preliminary injunction against college sports’ governing body.<\/a><\/p>\n

Heinecke took legal action against the NCAA late last month in his continued fight for a sixth year of eligibility. His initial petition to the NCAA was denied in January, with the organization upholding its decision upon appeal in February. Heinecke, with the backing of Oklahoma’s athletics department\u2014including general manager Jim Nagy and new athletics director Roger Denny\u2014decided to take the next step in his quest for eligibility relief when he filed for a preliminary injunction March 23 in Norman.<\/p>\n

The NCAA’s response, as reported by The Norman Transcript<\/a> and The Oklahoman<\/a> on Monday night, attempted to combat several of Heinecke’s claims in the initial filing.<\/p>\n

Among the arguments in the NCAA’s response were that Heinecke was not entitled to a waiver, nor has he provided sufficient evidence to warrant a waiver for a sixth year of eligibility. It also argued that Heinecke cannot demonstrate that being denied a waiver would cause him irreparable harm, as he claimed in his initial filing.<\/p>\n

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According to the NCAA’s response, Heinecke “chose to attend Ohio State on a lacrosse scholarship without any guarantee he could try out for the football team, let alone obtain a roster spot, which was a circumstance expressly within his control.” The organization argued that Heinecke made the decision to play lacrosse at OSU on scholarship despite multiple scholarship opportunities from Division-I football programs \u2014 including Navy, Army, UCO and Northeastern State.<\/p>\n

Heinecke’s initial filing argued that he did not have the opportunity to walk-on to the Buckeyes’ football team because the program did not hold tryouts that season. During his time at Ohio State, he appeared in three games for the lacrosse team before opting to transfer to Oklahoma, where he walked on to the Sooners’ football program in 2022.<\/p>\n

He spent the last four years at Oklahoma, redshirting in 2022 without seeing the field before appearing in all 26 games over the 2023 and 2024 seasons, primarily in a special teams capacity. Heinecke broke out last season and emerged as an All-SEC linebacker while playing in all 13 games and making five starts for one of the nation’s best defenses. He totaled 74 tackles, including 12 for a loss, with three sacks, four pass breakups and a forced fumble.<\/p>\n

Heinecke, who participated in the Senior Bowl in January and the NFL Combine in February, filed the lawsuit against the NCAA seeking the injunction because he wants to “compete in the precise number of college football seasons allowed by the NCAA.” The NCAA is counting his 2021 season at Ohio State, when he appeared in three lacrosse games, against his eligibility.<\/p>\n

An emergency hearing is set for Thursday April 16 in Norman, with Judge Thad Balkman \u2014 an OU law school graduate \u2014 assigned to the case. The hearing is one week before the start of the NFL Draft and two days before Oklahoma’s spring game.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The NCAA on Monday filed its response in Cleveland County District Court to Owen Heinecke’s motion for a…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":710438,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[1318,1317,1315,1316,62,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-710437","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-football","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-ncaa","10":"tag-ncaa-football","11":"tag-ncaafootball","12":"tag-sports","13":"tag-united-states","14":"tag-unitedstates","15":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116362048075617991","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/710437","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=710437"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/710437\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/710438"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=710437"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=710437"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=710437"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}