At Plough's last lunch, he said the NCAA sited precedence about (i think) a volleyball player in a similar situation. What's crazy to me is that the NCAA's stance on eligibility seems so fluid in most cases, but so rigid here. Last year, they decided that JC years didn't count because a player threatened a lawsuit. What's the justification besides trying to avoid a lawsuit?

That being said....if Rex's injury was an ACL, how confident should we be that we would be physically ready for next season?

9 months should land him back in fall camp no?

Anyone have any documentation stating that playoff games don't count as scheduled games? Everything I've found indicates they do, there are precedents where they did, and I can't find a report of a change that is said to have occurred last year.

I’ve seen it on the ncaa website. I’ll look for it.

Has the University's Appeal been filed?

I think twice.

I found one PDF that indicated games cancelled do count, but it was from 2001.
The rule is updated in 2001 to use the term scheduled games intentionally rather than the previous word completed games, specifically to include games cancelled due to weather. The appeal because the game didn't complete looks like a losing argument as the rule intends to count those games

On the other hand I found a 2022 powerpoint that gave example that clearly counted NCAA championships to determine denominator for 30% rule..

I agree with River the obtuse NCAA eligibility rules will not be in the Conners favor. But bear in mind that all of the rules of the game have been affected/changed by the House settlement. Now, the House court has unequivocally stated that the ability of a player to achieve NIL money is a fundamental right of the student athlete. And this is precedent. In Robinson v. NCAA the court ruled that if an eligibility decision by the NCAA negatively impacted a player’s ability to achieve NIL income it could be determined that it was an unfair antitrust decision. A restraint on the player’s ability to earn money. A violation of Federal Antitrust laws. Let’s ride the wave and see how this all plays out. I hope that the lawsuit is filed in the northern district of the federal district court in Oakland and comes before the district judge Claudia Wilken. She is the judge who decided the House case. She is a great judge.

I for one would like to state that I am interested in buying official Connors bros merch but them not being able to play next year will directly dampen my interest and make me less motivated to get products with their names, images, and likenesses on them.

Was that a substantive decision in a similar situation or just a case about standing or something?

I believe the gist of the lawsuit has to do with their potential future earnings that losing a year takes away.

I can’t figure how the NCAA can say ‘oh yeah, JC play now doesn’t count’ but toes the line on a situation like this.

The NCAA didn’t say JC years don’t count, multiple courts issued injunctions for individual players leading the NCAA to suspend counting JC years pending appeal or the NCAA getting anti trust exemption, recognizing the rule was unenforceable. Our judicial system doesn’t consider the big picture. Hence our current situation with NIL, cash payments etc. because the courts in effect decide the NCAA has no right to regulate college sports.

I would be nice if Mercer would join into this legal action for the benefit of their players who are affected by this nonsense

Dr Mike, I totally agree with you. In a sense this case should be far easier for the court than the Robinson cases because it could only affect the Conners situation rather than challenging an entire NCAA policy, I.e. the so-called “5 year rule” which I assume would be the Mercer position. But yes, it would be better if Mercer got involved here. I will add that the K. Robinson v. NCAA case was abruptly dismissed in august. This usually means that a confidential settlement was reached. But again, how does the NCAA plausibly argue that their decision that the Mercer game was a “non-game” yet for the Conners it was a “real game” which just had to be deleted for other reasons. That decision deprived the Conners of their one last season of eligibility just like the one year of lost eligibility in both the Robinson cases. Seems like an arbitrary and capricious decision. To me, of course!

The cancelled game is rare in football but more common in sports like baseball. The hardship rule applies to all sports. They weren't capricious and arbitrary when they wrote the rule using the term "scheduled" in place of "completed" which was used previously for the hardship rule, it was intentional. An example the rule change document gave in 2001 was athletes not knowing until the end if the season whether they were going to lose their hardship rights if the games late in the season were rained out. There is a logic to their position, whether we agree or not.

So, if a game is scheduled but cancelled before the game was to be played the following Sat. Would be counted as a game played, but the visiting team never even traveled to the game location.
So, a cancelled game would always count as a scheduled game.

So, a team that cancels their scheduled season for a reason the players would all lose a year of eligibility and never played a game. Just theoretical based on their wording

Therefore the Ags Connors played in 14 scheduled games according to the wording.
And all players who were hurt also played at least 12 scheduled games. Not games they participated in but scheduled games.

If a game js scheduled then cancelled before anyone participates it counts as no participatiom.
If no one participates in any games then no one participated in 30% of them.

The rule is that the number of games participated in must be less than 30% of the scheduled games. If 30% of the scheduled games is fraction they round up to the next whole number. This is why the issue to me is what is the number of scheduled games? Do playoff games count? They did for the Eastern Washington QB in 2018.. They did in the examples the NCAA published for other sports in 2022. If they count Connors satisfies the rule., If they don't he doesn'f.

If the NCAA is reasonable, these sorts of scenarios should bias to the benefit of the player.

https://x.com/SamHerderFCS/status/2005293430503825891

Looks like SIU QB is getting another year of eligibility from the NCAA..

Anything similar between this case and the Conner's situation?

I did write a letter to the AD asking for him to make public the NCAA decision letter in the Conners case. No response as of yet.

DJ Williams missed most of two seasons, 2022 and 2024 with injury, The waiver he needed was because of the five year rule. He his first season was 2021. He qualified fro a medical redshirt after playing in three games in 2024 and one in 2022.