Less than 24 hours after the NCAA Division I Cabinet approved a monumental change in eligibility rules, a group of 15 college basketball players filed a lawsuit in an Ohio state court claiming the new age-based model unfairly shuts them out of further competition.
The NCAA will now allow athletes five seasons of competition over a five-year period that begins with their full-time enrollment or the academic year following their 19th birthday, whichever occurs first. The move will all but eliminate waivers or redshirt years for extended eligibility except for religious missions, pregnancy or active-duty military service. No longer will extensions be considered for athletes who are injured.
Athletes whose eligibility expired by spring 2026 under the traditional model — four years of competition over five years — will not be allowed a fifth year of competition under the new rules that go into effect this fall.
The lawsuit filed Wednesday in Cincinnati (Hamilton County) seeks temporary and permanent injunctive relief that would allow a fifth year of competition for athletes who graduated from high school in 2022 and began their college sports careers that fall and never redshirted.
The new eligibility rule “unjustifiably restrains their ability to earn money through use of their name, image, and likeness (‘NIL’) connected to their work as Division I athletes,” attorneys Ryan Downton and Charles Rittgers wrote in the complaint.
Similar lawsuits are expected to be filed in other states. A message seeking comment was left with an NCAA spokesperson.
Nine of the plaintiffs have played or planned to play next season at Ohio schools. The rest, according to the complaint, have played multiple games in the state.
The complaint said class of 2022 athletes competed for playing time against older athletes who had eligibility extended because of the COVID-19 pandemic. It also noted the NCAA allowed 2022 high school graduates to play a full professional season before enrolling in 2023 and that they are not excluded from playing in 2026-27.
“NCAA athletes have a reasonable expectation that they will be treated fairly by the NCAA and that NCAA rules will be applied consistently, regardless of the athlete’s background before they attend an NCAA school and regardless of the year in which they graduated from high school,” the complaint said.
The lawsuit points out that the plaintiffs don't challenge the concept of a defined eligibility period or the five-for-five rule itself.
“Rather, they challenge the NCAA’s application of the rule” that allows players they competed against from the high school class of 2017-20 and 2023-25 an additional year of competition while denying plaintiffs the same opportunity," the attorneys wrote. “The NCAA then compounded the problem by allowing former professional players to compete in their fifth year following high school graduation regardless of the number of professional games they had played, while denying plaintiffs the same opportunity for a fifth year of competition.”
AP college sports: https://apnews.com/hub/college-sports
FILE - This photo taken with a fisheye lens shows the NCAA logo displayed at mid-court before Albany's practice for a second-round game of the NCAA college basketball tournament March 21, 2013, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum, File)
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — A rural area of Northern California experienced its strongest earthquake since 1940 on Wednesday morning, causing some injuries but no immediate reports of major damage, officials said.
The epicenter of the quake, with a preliminary magnitude of 5.6, was about 7 miles (12 kilometers) northwest of the agricultural town of Willits, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. It was widely felt, including in the coastal city of Fort Bragg. The initial quake was centered inland about 50 miles (80 kilometers) east of Fort Bragg at 8:10 a.m. PT, and the USGS said it was about 5 miles (8 kilometers) deep.
The area in Mendocino County dotted with small, agricultural towns is 140 miles (225 kilometers) northeast of San Francisco.
The Mendocino County Executive Office said some injuries have been reported but provided no details. A message left with the office was not immediately answered.
Power outages are affecting more than 6,000 residents of six towns near the epicenter, the office said in a statement, and encouraged people to stay off the highways and roads to allow work crews to inspect for damage and make repairs.
Brie Leon and her colleagues had just opened Club Calpella Restaurant when the building started shaking, rattling plates and liquor bottles.
“I had just turned the open sign on and went back into the kitchen, and that’s when it happened,” she said. “It almost felt like something hit the building.”
The restaurant is in Calpella, California, a town about 10 miles (16 kilometers) south of the epicenter and in a region of Mendocino County that has been struck by smaller quakes this year.
This was the biggest earthquake in nearly nine decades in the region, which is not on a major fault, said Lucy Jones, a veteran California seismologist.
“The area is not without earthquakes, but they’re usually smaller than this,” Jones said. She added that aftershocks are likely, but they’ll “probably stay on the low side.”
Three other quakes under a 2.7 magnitude struck near the epicenter within an hour.
Leon said the quake knocked frames off the walls and bottles off the shelves in the restaurant and the stockroom next door. She and other servers were cleaning up not long after to welcome customers for breakfast.
“It wasn’t a big, big quake, but things went everywhere,” she said.
Alan Harris and his family were at home in Kelseyville, about 40 miles (64 kilometers) southeast of the epicenter, when he received an earthquake alert on his cellphone. Soon after, the house began shaking.
“I yelled downstairs immediately to my wife and daughter to make sure they were hanging on,” Harris said. “It was scary. You could hear things crashing, mostly on the third floor of the house.”
A security camera inside Harris’ home shook vigorously as the quake struck. A few loud, crashing sounds can be heard on the video footage before Harris calls out: “Is everyone OK?”
It lasted only about 30 seconds. Framed photos fell off the walls and a computer monitor was knocked over, Harris said. Nothing appeared badly damaged, he added, noting he found no structural damage to the house.
Nearly 657,000 earthquake early warning alerts were sent by the MyShake App throughout Northern California, the California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services said. Cal OES had not received any reports of damage or injuries but it was coordinating with authorities to evaluate impacts, the office said in a statement.
Weber reported from Los Angeles. Associated Press reporter Russ Bynum contributed from Savannah, Georgia.
Redwood Valley Market owner Alex Chehada picks up items that fell off the shelves after an earthquake in Redwood Valley, Calif., Wednesday, June 24, 2026. (Kent Porter/The Press Democrat via AP)
Redwood Valley Market owner Alex Chehada watches his closed circuit feed showing the time when an earthquake struck in Redwood Valley, Calif., Wednesday, June 24, 2026. (Kent Porter/The Press Democrat via AP)
Redwood Valley Market owner Alex Chehada looks at items which fell off the shelves after an earthquake in Redwood Valley, Calif., Wednesday, June 24, 2026. (Kent Porter/The Press Democrat via AP)
