Three current and former NCAA Division III athletes filed a proposed federal class action this week accusing the organization of illegally banning athletic scholarships across more than 400 member schools. The lawsuit, filed in federal court in Los Angeles, argues the ban amounts to fixing the price of athletic labor at zero for the roughly 210,000 athletes who compete in the division each year.
The case, Connor Printz et al v. National Collegiate Athletic Association, was filed Friday in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California and carries docket number 2:26-cv-12448, according to Reuters. The named plaintiffs are Jackson Hale, a senior defensive back at Pacific Lutheran University; Connor Printz, who played basketball at Claremont McKenna College from 2020 to 2024; and Chris Jennings, who swam and played lacrosse at the University of Lynchburg from 2019 to 2023, per The College Investor.
At the center of the complaint is NCAA Division III Bylaw 15.01.3, which bars member schools from awarding financial aid based on athletic leadership, ability, participation or performance. The bylaw states that a school “shall not award financial aid to any student on the basis of athletics leadership, ability, participation or performance,” according to NCAA.org. The plaintiffs contend that rule illegally fixes the price of Division III athletic labor at zero, as reported by Sportico.
An $80,000 Price Tag and a Lawsuit Years in the Making
Printz says he left basketball during the 2023-24 season after taking out substantial student loans to cover nearly $80,000 in tuition, room and board that year, Sportico reported. The plaintiffs are seeking an injunction barring enforcement of the scholarship ban along with treble damages under the Clayton Act for athletes who have competed in Division III since October 21, 2022, according to Yahoo Sports.
Division III schools generally cannot award athletic scholarships, though athletes may still receive merit-based or need-based financial aid, per NCAA.org. The NCAA's own financial-aid reporting program requires member institutions to compare the aid packages of freshman and transfer athletes against those of other freshmen and transfers, with reviews triggered when variance estimates exceed 4 percent or other statistical outliers appear, per the same NCAA materials.
Echoes of a Lawsuit That Failed More Than a Decade Ago
This is not the first time Division III's no-scholarship policy has faced a legal challenge. A federal court in Indiana dismissed similar claims in Rock v. NCAA in 2013, finding the ban presumptively pro-competitive at the pleading stage, and that case ultimately collapsed after the court denied class certification in 2016, according to Sportico's reporting.
The new plaintiffs are leaning instead on the Supreme Court's 2021 ruling in NCAA v. Alston, which held that agreements among NCAA conferences restricting athletic-related benefits are subject to antitrust scrutiny, the outlet noted. Per Reuters, the plaintiffs are represented by Andrew Purdy of Brown Neri Smith & Khan, Michael Goldberg of ArrowBlue, Christine Brown of Christine Brown Sports Law, and Matt Strauser of Burns Charest. The NCAA has not yet made any appearances as defendant counsel, Reuters reported.
A Division Built Without Scholarships, Now Facing Scrutiny
Division III includes schools such as Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Johns Hopkins University, the University of Chicago, Williams College and Caltech, per Reuters, and the lawsuit claims it is the NCAA's fastest-growing division by school count. More than 175,000 athletes compete in Division III in a single academic year, the plaintiffs say, and many Division III schools maintain athletic budgets that outpace those of larger programs, according to the complaint as described by Reuters. Division III schools have agreed not to use any of that athletic budget money as aid to reduce athletes' college costs, the lawsuit alleges.
The NCAA has said Division III's lack of athletic scholarships is a core principle of the division, maintaining that athletics participation should not be financially rewarded in the same way as academic achievement, Reuters reported. The organization has faced a mounting number of lawsuits over its eligibility rules in recent years, and a federal appeals court is currently weighing a multibillion-dollar settlement meant to compensate thousands of athletes for the commercial use of their names, images and likenesses, per the same report.
A Financial Gap Between Divisions
The lawsuit lands against the backdrop of a dramatically different financial landscape in Division I, where schools paid 34,915 athletes about $1.77 billion in the first year of revenue sharing, according to The College Investor. Division III, by contrast, had 210,878 athletes competing in NCAA championship sports during the 2024-25 academic year, per Yahoo Sports, none of them eligible for athletic scholarships under current rules. Whether a court will treat that gap as evidence of an antitrust violation, or whether the case will fare any better than the failed Rock litigation a decade ago, remains to be seen.
