Why Does Antitrust Law Keep Showing Up in College Sports?

Practical Explainer | September 12, 2026

College sports has a strange structural problem.

Ohio State cannot play football by itself. Neither can Alabama, Michigan, Duke, UConn, or anyone else. Schools need common opponents, common eligibility standards, common playing rules, schedules, championships, and some degree of coordinated governance. In that sense, cooperation among competitors is not a defect in sports. It is the product.

But those same schools also compete with one another—for athletes, coaches, media money, sponsorships, fans, championships, and increasingly, athlete compensation.

That is why antitrust law keeps appearing.

The central question is usually not whether the NCAA, a conference, or a group of schools may make rules. Of course they may. The harder question is which rules are actually necessary to create and operate college sports, and which rules suppress economic competition more than the sport requires.

That distinction has driven some of the most consequential changes in college athletics, from television rights to scholarships, NIL, direct athlete compensation, transfers, and now even eligibility rules.

Most modern college-sports antitrust cases arise under Section 1 of the Sherman Act, which prohibits agreements that unreasonably restrain interstate trade or commerce. The statute literally speaks of “every” agreement in restraint of trade, but courts have long recognized that virtually every contract restrains someone from doing something. The real question is whether the restraint is unreasonable.

That matters enormously in college sports because NCAA rules are generally the product of collective action among schools that would otherwise compete with one another.

If competing schools agree that none of them will pay an athlete more than a certain amount, allow a certain category of athlete to play, hire another coach, sell certain television rights independently, or recruit athletes in a particular way, that agreement may affect competition.

Sometimes that coordination is perfectly legitimate.

Sometimes it is not.

Antitrust law is the mechanism courts use to tell the difference.

Normally, competitors are supposed to compete.

Ford and General Motors generally cannot get together and agree what their employees should earn. Restaurants cannot collectively decide what chefs may be paid. Competing businesses ordinarily cannot agree to limit output or divide customers.

Sports is different because competitors must cooperate to create the competition itself.

The Supreme Court recognized that problem in NCAA v. Board of Regents of the University of Oklahoma in 1984. The NCAA's television rules restricted how many college-football games could be televised and limited schools' ability to negotiate their own television contracts. Those restrictions looked like classic price and output restraints.

But the Court did not simply declare every NCAA agreement illegal. It recognized that sports necessarily requires some horizontal cooperation. Teams must agree on such things as field dimensions, player numbers and the basic rules of competition.

The important point was the next one: the fact that some cooperation is necessary does not mean every restraint adopted by the NCAA is necessary.

The NCAA lost the case. Its television restrictions suppressed output and interfered with market competition without sufficient justification.

That basic tension still defines NCAA antitrust law more than four decades later.

Most NCAA antitrust disputes can be understood through four questions.

That framework sounds abstract. In practice, it becomes much easier to understand.

Imagine 50 universities independently decide that they do not want to pay athletes more than $25,000.

That is one thing.

Now imagine those same universities agree that none of them may pay more than $25,000.

That is an antitrust issue.

The distinction is coordinated conduct. Section 1 is principally concerned with agreements among separate economic actors.

NCAA rules often create exactly that structure: schools that would otherwise compete agree that everyone must operate under a common limitation.

That does not automatically make the rule unlawful. But it gets the antitrust analysis started.

“Market definition” sounds like antitrust jargon because it is. The idea is simpler than the terminology.

A court needs to identify where the competition allegedly being restrained actually occurs.

Think of it as drawing a box around the economic contest.

In Board of Regents, the dispute involved college-football television rights.

In NCAA v. Alston, the relevant market included competition among Division I schools for elite football and basketball players' athletic services. The district court found that NCAA members competed intensely for those athletes while collectively limiting what they could offer them. The Supreme Court noted that the NCAA did not meaningfully dispute that market finding.

That is also where the term monopsony sometimes appears.

A monopoly describes powerful sellers.

A monopsony describes powerful buyers.

If many NCAA schools collectively restrict what they will pay athletes whose services they are competing to obtain, the concern is buyer-side market power: the schools may be able to suppress compensation below what competition would otherwise produce.

Market definition can make or break a case. A plaintiff cannot simply say, “This rule hurt me.” The question is whether the rule harmed competition in a properly defined market.

That distinction became especially clear in September 2026.

In Blythe v. NCAA, the Ninth Circuit held that the NCAA's Five-Year Rule is a commercial restraint subject to Sherman Act scrutiny. But the athlete still lost his preliminary-injunction argument because the evidentiary showing concerning the relevant market and substantial anticompetitive effects was inadequate.

That case captures an important principle:

A rule can be subject to antitrust law without violating antitrust law.

The next question is not simply whether someone dislikes the rule.

Antitrust law cares about competition.

Depending on the case, competitive harm might mean:

The NCAA once capped compensation for certain entry-level Division I coaches. In Law v. NCAA, the Tenth Circuit upheld a finding that the restriction violated Section 1. The schools were competing for coaches but collectively imposed a salary ceiling on them.

The target of the restraint changes.

The underlying antitrust question does not.

This is where sports becomes different from most industries.

A restraint can produce competitive benefits.

Suppose schools agree that football teams may use only 11 players at a time. Technically, that restricts how schools compete. A wealthy school cannot put 17 defenders on the field.

Nobody seriously thinks that violates the Sherman Act.

The rule helps create the product itself.

Other rules are harder.

Maybe the NCAA argues that a compensation restriction preserves a distinction between college and professional sports.

Maybe an eligibility restriction promotes academic integration.

Maybe a roster rule promotes competitive balance.

Maybe a transfer window improves scheduling and roster stability.

Those can be legitimate arguments—but antitrust law generally requires more than labeling something “amateurism,” “competitive balance,” or “integrity.”

The claimed benefit has to connect to competition.

Most NCAA restraints are evaluated under what antitrust law calls the rule of reason.

Despite the intimidating name, its basic logic is straightforward.

First, the plaintiff generally must show that the challenged restraint has a substantial anticompetitive effect.

If that showing is made, the defendant may identify a procompetitive justification.

If a legitimate competitive benefit exists, the plaintiff may try to show that the same benefit could be achieved through a substantially less restrictive alternative.

The Supreme Court described that familiar three-step framework in Alston, while emphasizing that it is not supposed to become a rigid mechanical checklist. The ultimate inquiry remains practical: Does this particular restraint harm competition more than its legitimate benefits justify?

That is why seemingly similar NCAA cases can produce different outcomes.

Facts matter.

Evidence matters.

The particular rule matters.

And the market matters.

For years, NCAA defendants frequently relied on language from Board of Regents suggesting that amateurism helped distinguish college sports from professional sports.

But Alston rejected the idea that those observations created some broad antitrust immunity.

The Supreme Court unanimously upheld an injunction preventing the NCAA from restricting certain education-related athlete benefits. More importantly for future cases, the Court made clear that NCAA compensation restrictions are subject to ordinary antitrust scrutiny rather than extraordinary judicial deference simply because they involve college sports.

That did not mean every NCAA rule became illegal.

It meant the NCAA generally had to defend challenged commercial restraints the way other market participants do: with evidence.

That distinction helps explain much of what happened afterward.

For years, many people thought of antitrust litigation principally as a compensation issue.

That line has become increasingly difficult to maintain.

An eligibility rule can have enormous economic consequences when participation in Division I athletics brings scholarships, revenue-sharing payments, NIL opportunities, professional exposure and access to a valuable labor market.

Federal appellate courts have therefore increasingly treated certain eligibility restraints as commercial rules capable of antitrust scrutiny.

The Ninth Circuit's September 2026 decision in Blythe joined other circuits in concluding that the NCAA's Five-Year Rule is not categorically outside the Sherman Act merely because the NCAA describes it as an eligibility rule. But Blythe also demonstrates the other half of the equation: the athlete must still prove an antitrust case.

That is likely to be one of the defining fights of the next stage of college-sports litigation.

Wrong.

Nonprofit status is not a general exemption from the Sherman Act. The economic effect of the restraint matters.

Also wrong.

The need for cooperation is why many sports restraints receive rule-of-reason treatment. It is not a blank check.

No.

Antitrust protects competition, not every competitor. The plaintiff generally must connect the injury to harm in a relevant competitive market.

Blythe is a good modern example.

The comparison misses an important legal difference.

Many restraints in professional sports operate within collective bargaining relationships. Federal labor law can protect certain collectively bargained restraints from antitrust attack through the nonstatutory labor exemption. The Supreme Court applied that principle in Brown v. Pro Football.

That is fundamentally different from competing colleges simply agreeing among themselves how much athletes may receive.

Definitely not.

The federal court approved the House settlement in June 2025, resolving major athlete-compensation claims and establishing the current framework for institutional revenue sharing, NIL regulation and related Division I rules. The College Sports Commission now administers important parts of that system.

But a court-approved settlement is not a universal congressional exemption from the Sherman Act.

The continuing eligibility litigation proves the point.

There are really three ways the antitrust pressure on college sports could change.

The NCAA can change its rules.

Athletes and schools could eventually operate under a labor model in which certain restraints are collectively bargained.

Or Congress can change the law.

That third possibility is no longer theoretical.

As of September 12, 2026, the proposed Protect College Sports Act remains pending in Congress after advancing through the Senate Commerce Committee. The revised legislation would provide targeted antitrust protection for compliance with specified federal rules involving subjects including compensation, eligibility, transfers, recruiting and related enforcement. It would also create antitrust protection for certain pooled college-sports media arrangements. The legislation is not yet law, but Senate floor action is expected as Congress returns in September.

That fight matters because Alston essentially told college sports where to go if it wants broader immunity:

Congress.

For athletes, antitrust law has become one of the principal tools for challenging rules that restrict compensation, movement, eligibility and economic opportunity.

For schools and conferences, every significant collective rule now raises a familiar question: Is this genuinely necessary to operate the competition, or are competitors collectively limiting an economic choice they would otherwise make independently?

For the NCAA and College Sports Commission, the challenge is even harder. Governance requires uniformity. Antitrust law distrusts unnecessary uniformity among competitors.

And for fans, antitrust law is one of the quiet forces determining what college sports eventually becomes.

It helped break the NCAA's control over football television.

It helped dismantle compensation restrictions.

It helped accelerate NIL and direct revenue sharing.

Now it is testing eligibility rules.

The cases keep changing because college sports keeps changing.

The underlying tension does not.

Antitrust law keeps showing up in college sports because the entire system is built around an unusual economic arrangement:

Competitors must cooperate to create the game, while still competing in the markets surrounding the game.

The Sherman Act does not prohibit that cooperation.

It asks where cooperation ends and suppression of competition begins.

That is why nearly every major governance question eventually produces the same legal question:

Does this rule help make college sports possible—or does it merely prevent its participants from competing?

Until Congress, collective bargaining, or an entirely new governance structure draws that line differently, expect courts to keep answering it.