The order by Governor DeWine isn’t legislating eligibility. It simply instructs Ohio schools to decline to apply an extratextual eligibility restriction on Class of 2022 athletes. It is also demonstrative of the reality pointed out by Tennessee’s head coach Rick Barnes earlier today: This isn’t about athlete or lawyer greed. The NCAA’s mishandling of the five year rule rollout has caused the chaos the NCAA has so frequently argued (without a single real life example of a displaced athlete) would be caused by permitting 2022 athletes to play in the first place. From applying the rule retroactively only in part to drafting a rule that textually doesn’t contain the 2022 Carve Out to spending millions lobbying Congress for a law that likely provides 2022 athletes the same relief the NCAA is simultaneously spending millions of dollars in Big Law fees to fight in court— it is unequivocally the NCAA, not athletes, who created and is perpetuating the chaos. As a result of this conduct, the college basketball season, which is the NCAA’s cash cow, is now in a state of turmoil less than 3 weeks before the opening tip.