Causing Roster Chaos

As we begin the 2026-27 NCAA season, lawsuits surrounding the new 5-for-5 model have created roster uncertainty across the country.  After several athletes in the Class of 2026 sued for eligibility this year, a Colorado judge granted a preliminary injunction that gave a blanket waiver to all 2026 graduates an extra year of eligibility.  The NCAA appealed, which is yet to be heard.  Meanwhile, the Fall season has already started.  Clarity is very much needed, but doesn't appear to be coming anytime soon.

Depending on when the NCAA's appeal is heard and a final decision is made, there may be a massive influx of players who are suddenly available to schools.  You'd have to figure some of them will be added to rosters, taking a roster spot away from somebody else.  And, for any team that doesn't play a Spring sport, it'd be disruptive regardless of the timing.  These teams are either already playing, already practicing or about to begin the season.  Now you're talking about adding new players to the team?  Talk about late in the game!

Dan Hurley, for one, is not a fan of the current situation.  In fact, he finds it untenable.  Hurley has made it clear that he won't be adding any players to his roster during the season, no matter what the result of the NCAA's appeal is.  He went beyond that, though.  Hurley made it a point to say how frustrated he is and criticized the effect it'll have on recruiting.

"Now you can screw up high school recruiting," he said.  "You could screw up portal recruiting, not have a very good team, and now start plucking from a group of players in August and put together a team.  It makes it tough.  We did the best we could do in high school recruiting.  Now you've got this selection of portal players.  You put together the best team you can.  You start practicing for the summer, and now let's unleash 80 players into the sport in the first week of August.  I mean, we can't go on like this."

Hurley was also quick to note how incoming freshmen will be impacted, which is something not enough people are considering: "There are kids that are 17, 18 years old that potentially may lose out on opportunities.  So, it's not victimless.  At some point, you've got to care about the sport, especially if the sport has given you a lot.  If you're a coach and the sport has given you a lot, it's like doing things to hurt the sport so that you can win a little bit more."

His view is certainly a cynical one.  But there's no denying that Hurley has a point.  The transfer portal has already created chaos and upended the entire recruiting process.  Now you suddenly have the potential of all these players becoming available to join the roster after school has already started.  Enough is enough.

And this is coming from someone who agrees with the Colorado judge.  I think that those student-athletes who graduated in the Spring should be able to continue their careers this year should they so choose.  But I also agree with Hurley.  The summary judgment giving a blanket extra year of eligibility to every Class of 2026 graduate did take it a step too far.  Because, as he noted, teams already had their rosters set.

It is worth noting that there were a few exceptions to the judge's ruling.  In order to take advantage of the injunction, players would have needed to already be in the transfer portal when it opened in April.  Otherwise, they'd need to return to their existing team (provided the coach still wanted them and there was a roster spot...and that they're enrolled in grad school).  That affects several players who were rumored to be transferring should the injunction remain in place.  It's also unclear whether players who entered the NBA Draft but weren't selected, like Texas Tech's Darrion Williams, will be allowed to return.

While Hurley was obviously only talking about basketball and how it effects UConn, his comments apply to all sports and all schools.  Coaches made their rosters for this season and already did their recruiting, both among incoming freshmen and among transfers.  School is about to start, and the season has literally already started in Fall sports.  It's too late for Fall teams to make any changes at this point.  So why should the other sports be able to?

Incoming freshmen, meanwhile, have been the group that was most impacted by the change in the transfer portal a few years ago.  Suddenly, coaches went from recruiting freshmen to filling their roster with transfers.  Why bring in 18- or 19-year-olds when you can get a 23-year-old who already has three years of college experience instead?  Now, they stand to also lose roster spots to fifth-year seniors who may not have even been planning on coming back.  And, don't forget, this is the group that was the most screwed over by the COVID year everyone was given.  Just like they'll be the group most severely impacted by the 5-for-5 legislation.

None of that changes my support for the general idea of the 5-for-5 rule, which most agree is a good thing.  However the lawsuits play out, it'll only apply to the Class of 2026.  So, any freshmen who enroll in the Fall of 2027 will be the first to benefit from the 5-for-5 rule in two ways.  They'll go into college knowing they have five years AND know they won't suddenly have to compete with a group of fifth-year players for roster spots.  And, it'll certainly be nice to know that college athletes are between the ages of 18-24 without the 27-year-olds in their seventh year of eligibility at their fourth school who've turned the entire thing into a sham.

Of course, the 5-for-5 rule isn't the only piece of college sports legislation that was in the news this Summer.  The Protect College Sports Act has already passed the House and is on the Senate's docket for when they return from recess in September.  Federal legislation to regulate college sports is desperately needed, so here's hoping the Protect College Sports Act passes.  And that would certainly go a long way towards clearing up some of the mess that the current system has created.  But the Protect College Sports Act, assuming it passes, won't take effect until 2027-28 at the earliest.  Which does nothing to help the current situation.

A swift resolution is really what was needed here.  Once the 5-for-5 rule passed, the NCAA should've anticipated lawsuits.  Likewise, the Colorado judge should've anticipated an appeal after making the ruling.  That appeal needed to be heard and decided right away, though.  Because all the wait's doing is creating more uncertainty and potentially causing more chaos once a final decision is made.  Which is unfair to everybody.

Those Spring graduates may or may not get that fifth year of eligibility after all.  New recruits may lose roster spots to those fifth-year players.  Coaches have to build rosters not knowing who's available as a transfer, and may see competitors make a late addition or two that makes them significantly better.  So, as Dan Hurley said, it can't continue like this.  Because it's a mess right now.