Federal judge grants injunction suspending NCAA’s NIL rules

The NCAA will have to punt on enforcing its name, image, and likeness restrictions for now, due to a preliminary injunction granted Friday in a lawsuit against the organization.

The 13-page memorandum signed by U.S. District Judge Clifton Corker found that an NCAA policy banning college recruits from discussing NIL opportunities before they enroll in university caused “irreparable harm” to student-athletes.

“Without relief, the NCAA will continue to deprive Plaintiff States’ athletes of information about the market value for their NIL rights, thereby preventing them from obtaining full, fair-market value for those rights,” the opinion states. “Their labor generates massive revenues for the NCAA, its members, and other constituents in the college athletics industry — none of whom would dare accept such anticompetitive restrictions on their ability to negotiate their own rights. Those athletes shouldn’t have to either.”