NCAA Division III Scholarship Lawsuit Targets Ban

The NCAA Division III scholarship lawsuit could rewrite the rules for more than four hundred schools, after three current and former athletes filed a federal class action accusing the NCAA of fixing the price of athletic labor at zero.

What the lawsuit claims

According to Sportico, the complaint was filed on Friday in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California. The plaintiffs want to represent a class that could include hundreds of thousands of athletes who have competed in Division III since October twenty-first, twenty twenty-two.

"The NCAA has engaged in an ongoing conspiracy to fix the price of Division III athletic labor at zero by prohibiting every member of Division III, the NCAA's largest division at more than 400 schools, from offering a single penny of athletic scholarship," the complaint states, as quoted by Sportico.

The target is Division III Bylaw 15.01.3, which says a member school "shall not award financial aid to any student on the basis of athletics leadership, ability, participation or performance." The suit asks for damages and an injunction that would stop the NCAA from enforcing that rule.

Who is suing

The named plaintiffs are Jackson Hale, a senior defensive back at Pacific Lutheran University in Tacoma, Washington; Connor Printz, who played basketball at Claremont McKenna College from twenty twenty to twenty twenty-four; and Chris Jennings, who swam and played lacrosse at the University of Lynchburg in Virginia.

Printz's story is the one that lands. The complaint says he quit basketball early in the twenty twenty-three season to focus on his social media business, and that the choice was driven by money, since he had taken out big student loans to cover close to eighty thousand dollars in tuition, room and board. With even a partial scholarship, the filing argues, he would have played out his senior year.

The lawsuit also points to name, image and likeness money. It claims Printz received up to fifty thousand dollars in endorsement deals while playing at a Division III school, which the plaintiffs say clashes with the old argument that amateurism must be protected.

Why the case is a real threat

Sportico reports that about two hundred ten thousand athletes compete in Division III each year, according to the NCAA, and the plaintiffs are seeking treble damages under the Clayton Antitrust Act. If a large class is certified, the exposure could run into the billions, depending on the damages period and how the court views the harm.

The filing leans on the Supreme Court's unanimous Alston ruling, which said agreements among conferences that limit athletic benefits face antitrust scrutiny. It also lands in the Ninth Circuit, whose O'Bannon and Alston decisions helped pave the way to the House settlement.

There is a catch. Thirteen years ago a federal court in Indiana tossed Division III scholarship-ban claims in a case called Rock v. NCAA, ruling the ban was presumptively pro-competitive. The same lawyer behind that case, Steve Berman, later became class co-counsel in House v. NCAA, so the argument has been tested before and lost once.

What it means for athletes

Legal commentary has picked up the filing too. A Substack analysis by Kim Schatzel, citing the case filings, describes the case as Printz et al. v. NCAA and notes it could cover nearly one million athletes across more than four hundred institutions. For current players, the practical takeaway is simple: nothing changes on campus yet, but the clock on a legal fight has started.

Division III has long sold itself as the place where athletes play for love of the game, with no athletic aid. That model is part of why many students pick those schools. Critics of the lawsuit worry that scholarships could split the division and push small colleges into an arms race they cannot afford.

Supporters say the opposite: sports already cost players time, and tuition keeps climbing. The NCAA had not responded to Sportico's request for comment at the time of publication. A judge is unlikely to rule soon, and the case is far from a sure win. Still, in a college sports world reshaped by court losses for the NCAA, few people would bet against another big fight. Related coverage sits on the GenZ NewZ sports page.