The NCAA is facing a new challenge in college football — and across other sports — that could see it utilize the nuclear option against its member schools.
According to a report from On3's Ross Dellinger, the college athletics governing body is threatening to act under the "rule of restitution" in legal cases it wins against athletes suing for extra years of eligibility.
The 1975 rule permits the NCAA to retroactively fine schools and force them to vacate wins for fielding ineligible players. See the case of Oregon State basketball star Lonnie Shelton, as Dellinger references, for context.
NCAA eligibility battles set up potentially ugly consequences for schools
Eligibility limits have been pushed to their limits by a significant number of athletes, particularly in college football, to squeeze every last year out of their available time. Some players have participated in a total of seven college seasons thanks to a combination of redshirt years, injury waivers and COVID exceptions.
Well, the pandemic generation is gone and only the former two options are left to try and "stay in school." That's forcing the NCAA to scrutinize each case and frequently deny waiver requests.
The most notable of these cases have been taken to literal court in Vanderbilt quarterback Diego Pavia and Ole Miss passer Trinidad Chambliss. Both had their pleas heard and sided with by a judge who granted separate injunctions to prevent the NCAA from ending their college careers.
Pavia played out his final year in 2025 and Chambliss will get the opportunity to complete his second year at a Division I program this upcoming season. But that doesn't mean Vanderbilt and Ole Miss are in the clear.
Theoretically, if the NCAA appealed both of those cases and won, it could severely fine both programs or force them to vacate all wins in which Pavia and Chambliss participated.
How the NCAA can mitigate eligibility abuses and not look like bullies
Lets take the stakes even further. 2025 national champion Indiana fielded safety Louis Moore who earned his own court injunction to play last year. If the NCAA got that decision reversed, the Hoosiers' historically perfect 16-0 campaign would go up in smoke.
The NCAA doesn't want to do that (we hope).
Under the "rule of restitution" the NCAA can impose heavy fines among other non-record-impacting punishments. The former would and should be the most likely outcome in any future legal victories.
There's also the question of teams who lost to teams that fielded players participating under court injunctions. Should they be compensated in any way for what they might view as unfair competition?
Well, given the NCAA can impose fines, further financial restitution can be doled out in which the offending party has to pay all defeated foes the fair value of their scheduled matchup. Essentially a refund for so-called "buy games" and perhaps a standard price for conference matchups.
Would this potentially cause programs to nudge super seniors out the door if they fear legal action is required after a denied waiver? Probably.
But with the proper alterations to the NCAA bylaws - essentially fixing the mistakes it made in Chambliss' case, which was legitimate - then there likely wouldn't be as many instances of schools refusing to back athletes that feel entitled to an additional year.
This solution is going to require cooperation from both sides. The NCAA cannot just hover its hand over the big red button to strong arm schools into kicking potentially eligible athletes to the curb. That would just encourage the schools and conferences to eventually secede from their voluntary memberships and form a super league with new by laws.
But schools can't continue to throw resources at flimsy excuses to play another year just because an athlete is trying to maximize their own financial gain in absence of an NFL opportunity.
The era of the seventh-year super senior cannot be allowed to continue but enabling the college football nuclear option of vacating wins isn't acceptable either.