There was a quarterback on the Netflix show QB1 who was recruited by Harvard. No scholarship, so off he went to Kentucky. They showed his family and his home, but it was hard to know if the $300k price tag for Harvard would have been a problem (or if he would have received any need based aid). He outright said he’d like to go to Harvard but it didn’t make sense to pay $300k when he could go just about anywhere else for free.
The decision to go elsewhere for the money is made all the time. If the Brown student wanted money, he/she could have gone to a lot of other schools with prestige like Stanford, Duke, ND, UCLA. But somehow I don’t think a student who is recruited to Duke basketball is saying “Oh I really want to go to Brown but I guess I’ll HAVE to go play at Duke for the money.”
Now with NIL, the Brown student is free to go out and earn as much money as he/she wants. Or, get recruited to play at Brown and then don’t play if one feels exploited. I think the Ivy league may make more off of merchandise sales than ticket sales, tv rights, or parking, but if the student feels Brown is making money off him/her, then don’t play. There still won’t be a scholarship, but he doesn’t HAVE to be exploited like that.
I agree with many of the sentiments expressed here but I thought the legal question is whether the conference members are illegally conspiring to “price fix” thus depriving the athletes of the benefits of a competitive market that might drive up the price for their services.
It is sort of like the issue of industry non-competes that was recently declared illegal (where companies were promising not to hire away employees from rival companies, which meant those employees couldn’t increase their salaries by taking jobs at other companies).
If the league did not disallow athletic (or merit?) scholarships, each college could decide for itself if it wanted to offer them. Maybe none of the Ivy League schools would offer them still, and then the athletes wouldn’t have a case. But right now, the League is interfering in the market to the benefit of the schools and the detriment of the athletes.
The legal question is whether that interference in the market is illegal or allowable. I think it is an interesting question!
I just don’t get how it’s price fixing. Or why it’s to its advantage to do so. Unless one is suggesting that schools is the Ivy League are some kind of “other” not the same product as other colleges. The argument suggests that the only way to get a college education is to pay up - but one can shop at Target or at Gucci and still get clothes.
I don’t think I am explaining myself well. In any case, the agreement exists because the Ivy League is an athletic league. They agree to play by the same recruiting rules just like they agree on the number of days a team can practice.
I don’t see an issue. The Ivy schools are very transparent with their policy regarding merit and athletic scholarships - there’s no secret collusion. It’s not like these schools have done something these athletes didn’t know up front when they chose to enroll.
The difference is - and I’m not a lawyer and you make a great point. - the stance here is public and known vs in secret for the tech companies. Again not an attorney but there is nothing hidden here.
Could not, the Brown player, gone to say Fairleigh Dickinson or Siena or Hofstra and earned a scholarship (assuming they were recruitable ability wise ?)
It is always best to go to the source document, and not a news article.
Essentially, and antitrust laws are very nuanced, agreements between competitors (whether or not secret) to limit competition are illegal. The Plaintiffs’ argument is that the Ivy League schools (competitors) have agreed to not compete for athletes based on price (no athletic scholarships and no payment for athletic services). Whether or not the court will find, under all the facts and law, that the Ivy agreement is illegal, and whether any athlete was damaged and entitled to compensation, remains to be seen.
But it’s not limited to athletic scholarships, as none of the Ivy League schools offer any merit aid (athletic or other). What they do offer is the most generous need based aid of any set of schools.
Do you see this as different from D3 schools which are not allowed to offer any athletic scholarships per NCAA rules (and some do offer other types of merit, and of course need based aid)?
Seems like there is not collusion or damages happening because Ivy League schools have chosen to not offer merit aid, including athletic aid.
OTOH the lawsuit against the President’s 568 group (a cohort of need blind colleges which includes some of the Ivies, and which was dissolved last year) may be the one more likely to succeed.
I think this is a good point, and relevant to the case. Does the league require the members not offer any type of merit aid? If so, it seems that is a case for price-fixing also.
Or is each college deciding independently that they don’t offer merit aid? If it is independent, there is no case.
On the other hand (I am not a lawyer, and don’t know the specific factors that matter), does it matter whether the colleges are materially benefiting from the students? It’s clearly the case for Division I schools that they profit from money-sport athletes. But if the Ivy League schools are not clearly profiting from the athletes, does it matter if they are colluding to limit the “pay“ those students receive?
And, is this an issue for Division III schools? Is the league truly allowed to say those schools cannot offer scholarships? It seems like another court case in the making.
I don’t know all the NCAA history, but expect that NCAA rules prohibiting D3 schools from offering athletic scholarships happened when they initially went to 3 divisions in 1973 (and remember schools by and large choose which NCAA league they join).
D3 schools can give non-athletic merit aid to athletes (if they offer merit aid) but this merit aid has to be in line with the level of merit aid that non-athletes received. These averages and details must be reported to the NCAA each year, and yes, some schools have been smacked hard for giving relatively more merit aid to athletes.
D3 recruits are also prohibited from signing NLIs, which makes sense because NLIs are only for NCAA athletes who are receiving any athletic scholarship…not all D1/2 athletes sign an NLI, and of course no Ivy League athletes sign an NLI (which explains why Likely Letters became a thing in the Ivy League).
Notably, 40% of all NCAA athletes are in D3, and D3 athletic departments are per se non-revenue generating. NCAA Division III - Wikipedia
One of their arguments is Stanford and Duke offer athletic scholarships.
What they fail to realize is these schools also produce professional league athletes. So if the Ivies offered athletic scholarships, they may be be able to find much better athletes than the plaintiffs.
In those instances, some of these kids would be treated like any other Ivy applicant and get rejected from being admitted to a T10 school.
Do you mean any scholarship or just athletic scholarships? The NCAA sets the rules for Div 3 (no scholarships except when it says they are okay like lax at Hopkins and hockey at Colorado College). I don’t know if any other athletic conferences (NESCAC or other D3 conferences) also restrict other merit scholarships, but I don’t think so. The Ivy league definitely controls more than just the athletics of the eight schools - admission dates, scholarships, academic level of athletes to name a few. I’m not sure Michigan really cares if Nebraska gives a non-athletic scholarship to a 2.0 gpa student but both schools have to live by Big 10 rules for sports.
The NCAA is one big monopoly on college sports and they have been for decades. Even D1 schools are severely restricted on how many scholarships they can offer or what other types of aid it can offer in combination with those scholarships. For many years the Ivies could offer more aid than other D1 schools in certain circumstances. U of Maryland could only offer the equivalent of 12 men’s lax scholarships and couldn’t supplement that with need based aid but Yale could offer 100% need based aid to every player on the team if those players had financial need. Until just a few years ago, the schools couldn’t even feed the non-scholarship players or give scholarship players extra money for pizzas or snacks. The players were very limited on taking jobs on or off campus.
IMO, things are slipping away from the NCAA. It is losing control of athletic scholarships and the benefits because of Name/Image/Likeness, through the transfer portal, through schools now being able to give the max number of scholarships but then supplementing the total through need based aid. Does it really matter if the coach gives out the 12 scholarships but then an additional 12 students have need based aid? Still 24 scholarships. The schools used to have some control over the athletes because if they transferred they couldn’t play for at least a year, couldn’t take outside ‘booster’ money, had to play or they’d lose their scholarships. Now the schools are able to give any amount of money they want, the linemen can be sponsored by the pizza place or the car dealership, Nike can ‘hire’ any athlete it wants to to promote its shoes and t-shirts.
Olivia Dunne (gymnast LSU) makes millions from Tiktok and Instagram. Her scholarship doesn’t mean much as far as controlling her and I’m sure she doesn’t feel exploited by LSU. Because of the transfer portal she could transfer to any other school, get the full scholarship (gymnastics is a headcount sport) and compete immediately. I’m pretty sure she’s in control.
As mentioned by @MAmomto4 above, competitors can independently decide to take or not take certain actions. Here, the Plaintiffs assert that there is an express agreement (using your term, collusion) between the Ivy schools that they won’t provide athletic “merit” aid. Regarding D3 schools, whether or not the NCAA rules are legal also remains to be seen (the athletics cases that I’m aware of have all addressed NCAA rules for D1 schools).
I recommend reading about the antitrust troubles the Ivy league has had with financial aid. After the Ivies were accused of fixing financial aid offers by the Department of Justice, they entered into a consent decree (an agreement) restricting their behavior. Probably demonstrating the political power that the Ivy schools wield, congress quickly passed the so-called 568 exemption to the Sherman (Antitrust) Act that, more or less, allowed the Ivies to continue to agree on a common set of factors to consider for financial aid, as long as admissions decisions were “need blind” and each school independently determined the amount of financial aid given to an applicant. Interestingly, the 568 exemption expired last year.
Consider whether there is much of an intellectual distinction between the Ivy agreement to not offer athletic scholarships and the actions of the President’s 568 group. I understand that one might appear more or less troublesome to any given individual, but that is something friends can agree to disagree about.
The complaint asserts that the Ivies average sports revenue is $33 million (Low of $24 million at Brown; High of $47 million at Yale). Not Oregon ($391.8 million), Ohio State ($233.9 million) or Alabama ($214.4 million) 2022 numbers, but certainly not chump change. I didn’t look at the appendix that the Plaintiffs say support their Ivy numbers, but the complaint says it doesn’t factor in things like naming rights agreements, clothing sponsorships, apparel sales and broadcast rights, not to mention donations that result from sports (I bet Princeton’s donations are on the rise after this weekend).
While I know that none of the Ivy schools offer merit aid, I haven’t found a source that shows there is an actual agreement (outside of athletics) to not offer merit aid. Whether or not there is an agreement is crucial to an antitrust analysis.
It doesn’t seem that any school can be compelled to offer merit or athletic aid. Worst case it seems that the Ivy Agreement has to take out any references to the schools agreeing to not offer merit scholarships. But then each school can individually choose to not offer any merit aid, inducing athletic scholarships. Same as other D1 schools do today…some fund athletic scholarships to the max that NCAA allows, others limit scholarships, still others provide no scholarships for certain sports.
Another option for the Ivy League could be do move to D3, provided their current TV and other contracted sponsors agree.
Is the league truly allowed to say those schools cannot offer scholarships?
Isn’t the point of a league that it establishes common rules for its members?
Some boarding school leagues specifically do not include schools that have PGs. Most specify the number of years an athlete can compete. They set cut-off times for inclusion in conference meets. They have rules for when coaches can first contact recruits.
Adding to this rules about whether they can offer money for athletic merit (i.e. sports scholarship) doesn’t seem inconsistent.
The lawsuit references the Ivy League Manual of 2017-18 (seems to be the most recent), which state only need based financial aid (and that each member institutution has their own standard of calculating economic need):
The members of the Group reaffirm their prohibition of athletic scholarships.
Athletes shall be admitted as students and shall be awarded financial aid only on
the basis of economic need. (page 39)
The members of the Group reaffirm their prohibition of athletic scholar-
ships. Athletes shall be admitted as students and awarded financial aid
only on the basis of the same academic standards and economic need as are
applied to all other students (provided that each institution shall apply its
own standard of economic need). (page 152)
$47M to Yale is not large and IMO it isn’t going to influence decisions like $233M will at Ohio State. At Yale, the coaches get to recruit without regard to money, but can’t use it to get the players they really want either. At Ohio State, the coach has to worry about giving one player too much of his pot of money but if he really really wants one player, he can offer a full ride. It’s all a balancing act and some will think Yale’s method (need aid only) is best while others will think the Ohio State coaches have a better opportunity to get the players it wants, even the “donut hole” ones who can’t afford the Ivies.