The attorneys general of both Tennessee and Virginia have filed a lawsuit against the NCAA, one day after the UT chancellor criticized the body amid its investigation into possible recruiting violations related to NIL rules in football and other sports programs.
The suit, filed in the Eastern District of Tennessee, claims that the NCAA is “enforcing rules that unfairly restrict how athletes can commercially use their name, image, and likeness at a critical juncture in the recruiting calendar.”
Tennessee added: “These anti-competitive restrictions violate the Sherman Act, harm the States, and the welfare of their athletes, and should be declared unlawful and enjoined.”
The day before, it was revealed that the NCAA was investigating the Tennessee football program and other athletic programs and an NIL collective funded by boosters that works with athletes.
Tennessee responded when chancellor Donde Plowman wrote a harshly critical letter to NCAA chief Charlie Baker after school officials met with NCAA reps to talk about the allegations against the school.
Plowman said that leaders in college football and other sports have an obligation to students and their families to act in their interest, but that the NCAA had fallen short in providing a clear set of rules for how to do so.
She criticized the NCAA’s “vague and contradictory… memos, emails, and ‘guidance'” that “created extraordinary chaos.”
“In short,” Plowman said, “the NCAA is failing.”