Thanks, Pavia: Mizzou Tigers & other college athletes could benefit from rulings

Missouri Tigers student-athletes may be monitoring ongoing court cases closely to see if they will be eligible for an extra year of college athletics.

Diego Pavia, the Vanderbilt quarterback Mizzou is scheduled to face on Oct. 25, could continue shaping eligibility extensions through his legal battle against the NCAA. It has already benefitted certain Tigers.

On Tuesday, attorney Ryan Downton laid out a series of arguments on behalf of Pavia in an appeals court challenging the NCAA’s eligibility rules regarding junior college participation.

To play this season, Pavia needed to be granted a preliminary injunction. A Tennessee court ruled in December that the NCAA could no longer count his seasons played at the juco level against his eligibility. The ruling also spurred blanket waivers that allowed all former juco athletes to play another year, including Mizzou linebacker Triston Newson who played at Northeast Mississippi CC from 2020-22, and cornerback Stephen Hall, who played at Northwest Mississippi CC from 2020-21.

However, the NCAA appealed the ruling, so Pavia and Downton are back in court hoping to uphold it for the sake of future juco transfers. It should be noted that regardless of the case’s outcome, Pavia and others granted the same waiver are safe to play this year.

A transcript of the hearing shared by Boise State business law professor Sam Ehrlich shows Downton also remarked that he would challenge the NCAA’s redshirt law (also here at around the 38:00 mark) if the court deems both NCAA rules subject to antitrust law. In both cases, the heart of Downton’s argument is that the NCAA is unfairly limiting athletes’ ability to make money during the years they are eligible to play at the Division 1 level.

The effort would solely be for the benefit of other college athletes, because Pavia himself posted Tuesday on X that this year will, indeed, be his last in college.

Mizzou baseball coach Kerrick Jackson’s squad could see an outsized impact if Pavia and his attorney win the appeal for former juco athletes. Infielders Gehrig Goldbeck and Keegan Knutson, outfielder Cayden Nicoletto and pitcher Aeneas Clark would be granted extra years of eligibility as they transferred from jucos. In softball, pitcher Courtney Donahue, who played at Des Moines Area CC, would receive two extra years of D1 competition.

Pavia is not the only Vanderbilt athlete hoping to challenge the redshirt law. A separate lawsuit brought against the NCAA by Commodores linebacker Langston Patterson and defensive lineman Issa Ouattara, among others, on Sep. 2 directly challenges the association’s redshirt rule. The lawsuit requests that the NCAA allow its athletes to compete for every year of their “five-year eligibility window,” (177) which, if allowed, would in practice end the redshirt system.

This topic isn’t new. The “five in five” proposal is something the NCAA has been considering, according to Yahoo Sports. But the Patterson vs. NCAA lawsuit is the first time the NCAA will be forced to confront it head-on in a class-action suit.

Rulings could have a wide-ranging effect on eligibility for Mizzou athletes. For all sports excluding football, athletes are currently barred from taking the field for even a single play in order to be eligible for a redshirt year. However, on the gridiron, the current practice allows athletes to participate in four or fewer regular-season games, plus any postseason contests, to retain eligibility for the redshirt.

Players have already argued the system is unfair to non-football athletes because it forces them to make redshirt decisions faster, but if the “five in five” proposal becomes law, it would render this complaint moot.

Nonrevenue sports could be big beneficiaries of the potential policy. Athletes competing in volleyball, softball and Olympic sports could have the opportunity to stay in college and continue bringing in NIL money that, for many, are the last dollars they will make playing sports. Mizzou volleyball stars Janet DeMarrais and Maya Sands, both seniors, would be able to continue their careers with a Tigers team that returned to the Sweet 16 last year for the first time since 2017.

Even in revenue sports, the vast majority of players won’t go pro. A report from the NCAA found that only 1.1% of draft-eligible college basketball players made the NBA in 2023, and barely over 20% played professionally anywhere. Everybody else? Another option could open up for them to play basketball one more year and continue making money from their brands or school revenue shares.

Certain football and basketball players may face more complicated decisions, not dissimilar from ones draft-eligible athletes have already had to face when deciding between playing professionally or coming back to school. Guys with NFL Draft hopes, like Mizzou wide receiver Kevin Coleman Jr., who is projected to be a Day 2 selection next year by ESPN’s Mel Kiper, likely won’t choose to return.

But others, like corner Toriano Pride Jr., could use it to come back if they don’t think the draft is the right decision or don’t expect to be selected. On3, a recruiting and NIL-focused outlet, estimates Pride’s NIL Valuation at $147,000, which he could leverage in a return to Mizzou next year. Of course, the minimum NFL rookie salary this year is $840,000, so even squeaking into the league would earn most players more.

Currently, there is no deadline on when the courts must rule in either case. In Pavia vs. NCAA, because oral arguments have been heard already, decisions can take up to months. In Patterson’s case, the NCAA has not yet responded to the complaint, so final decisions could be made deep into 2026 or even later.

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