LOUISVILLE, Ky. — More than 30 college athletes seeking one more season of play can keep competing after a Kentucky Court of Appeals judge on Friday turned down the NCAA’s request for emergency relief.
Judge Sara Walter Combs ruled that the NCAA had not shown the athletes’ temporary injunction would cause it the kind of immediate, severe harm needed to put the order on hold. She also wrote that courts gain nothing by reversing course again and again while the larger legal questions are sorted out. A three-judge panel will still take up the NCAA’s request for relief.
The athletes, all members of the high school Class of 2022, won the injunction from a Jefferson County Circuit Court judge on Oct. 16. It lets them play in 2026-27 while the NCAA appeals.
The group includes Missouri basketball player Mark Mitchell and LSU guard Skyy Clark, plus football players from Kentucky, Texas Tech and Louisville. With the ruling, the basketball players in the case can open their seasons next week.
At issue is the NCAA’s new five-for-five eligibility model, set to start next fall, which gives athletes five years to play beginning at age 19 or high school graduation, whichever comes first. Athletes who started college in 2022-23 and have already used four seasons were left out, and lawsuits in several states are challenging that cutoff.
The Kentucky decision followed a Thursday move by the Ohio Supreme Court that left in place an order keeping about two dozen athletes in a similar case eligible. The NCAA told its members it was deeply disappointed by the Ohio outcome.
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