Supreme Court win for college athletes in compensation case

Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote for the court that the NCAA sought “immunity from the normal operation of the antitrust laws,” an argument the court rejected. Gorsuch said that allowing colleges and universities to offer “enhanced education-related benefits … may encourage scholastic achievement and allow student-athletes a measure of compensation more consistent with the value they bring to their schools.”

Under current NCAA rules, students cannot be paid, and the scholarship money a college can offer is capped at the cost of attending the school.

The NCAA had defended its rules as necessary to preserve the amateur nature of college sports, preventing a blurring of the line between them and professional teams, with colleges trying to lure talented athletes by offering over-the-top benefits. A lower court had upheld the NCAA’s limits on scholarships and cash awards, and the high court wasn’t asked to weigh in on those.

Writing for only himself, Justice Brett Kavanaugh signaled where Monday’s decision may lead. He said there are “serious questions” about whether the NCAA’s other restrictions on compensating athletes can stand. Kavanaugh wrote that “traditions alone cannot justify the NCAA’s decision to build a massive money-raising enterprise on the backs of student athletes who are not fairly compensated.”

“Nowhere else in America can businesses get away with agreeing not to pay their workers a fair market rate on the theory that their product is defined by not paying their workers a fair market rate. … The NCAA is not above the law,” wrote Kavanaugh, who as a college student played on Yale’s junior varsity basketball team.