The NCAA typically does not allow athletes to compete in college sports if they have ever signed a professional contract. According to ESPN, the issue came to light when former Alabama men’s basketball player Charles Bediako decided to return to the team after spending the 2023-2024 season in the NBA G League, the NBA’s professional minor league affiliate.
Bediako decided to rejoin Alabama this season, playing in five games under head coach Nate Oats during an ongoing court challenge. According to CBS Sports, the court issued a temporary order allowing him to play while seeking the preliminary injunction, which ultimately ended up being denied by a Tuscaloosa County judge, ending his eligibility immediately.
To nobody’s surprise, Alabama head coach Nate Oats was not happy with the decision. According to 247Sports, Oats’s main gripe with the ruling was the inconsistency in the application of eligibility rules in the evolving world of amateurism.
If you look around the NCAA, it makes sense for Oats to be upset from an Alabama perspective. In recent years, the NCAA changed the eligibility rules surrounding junior hockey players and their new ability to play college hockey after they complete their time in major junior hockey leagues such as the Western Hockey League, Ontario Hockey League, or Quebec Maritimes Junior Hockey League (together, the CHL). This change came about after a lawsuit against the NCAA from former OHL player Rylan Masterson in the Western District of New York.
The flaw in Oats’s logic here comes from the fact that CHL junior hockey leagues are not considered professional. Yes, players could receive stipends, but they are not signing professional contracts like basketball players in the NBA G League are. This comparison would be more relevant if the NCAA allowed former East Coast Hockey League or American Hockey League players to come back as eligible college athletes, which would never happen.
The issue surrounding this decision is the NCAA’s longstanding position that athletes who sign professional contracts are prohibited from returning to college sports. According to ESPN, signing a contract with the NBA G League does qualify as giving up your amateur status. Rightfully so, the court did not want to intervene in the current amateurism framework set forth and followed by the NCAA.
The case is a perfect example of the NCAA figuring out where to draw the line on eligibility, a line that they recently have allowed to evolve with their junior hockey decision. It is unlikely that this will waver any further in that direction, even though evolution is rampant in the NCAA year after year.