The NCAA and the schools that run it have long figured that if something doesn’t go their way in federal court in Oakland, they can run across the country to Washington and have congressional Republicans legislate away the pain. If those pesky athletes keep demanding a bigger slice of an ever expanding pie, then the status quo can be maintained as fast as a bill can become a law.
But something very interesting has happened in the past week. On Friday, a federal judge in Oakland handed the NCAA its second consecutive defeat in an antitrust case, but as losses go, this one is pretty tolerable for the schools who would like to keep their rules against paying players anything beyond what the schools determine an athletic scholarship to include.