New antitrust lawsuit targets NCAA’s revenue-sharing cap, seeking to expand what colleges can pay athletes

A new antitrust lawsuit filed against the NCAA seeks to undo limits on what schools can pay athletes through revenue sharing in 17 states, including California. The case, filed June 9 in federal court in California, targets the current structure of compensation rules that followed the House v. NCAA settlement, and it argues those limits are illegal in states that have enacted NIL-related protections.

According to reporting on the lawsuit, the plaintiffs claim the NCAA and related entities coordinated an “agreement” to implement revenue-sharing restrictions that violate federal antitrust law and California state law, and that the restrictions unlawfully suppress competition among schools and brands for athletes’ NIL rights. The lawsuit also seeks triple damages for affected college athletes, framing the dispute not as a policy disagreement but as an unlawful market restraint.

The challenged cap being litigated has been tied to a framework that allows schools to distribute money to athletes, but within a ceiling that lawmakers and courts have treated as part of a negotiated settlement. Under the current setup, the federal court’s approval process has allowed revenue sharing while maintaining specific guardrails, including a revenue-sharing cap that reporting describes as $20.5 million. The new case contends that, in the 17 states covered by the filing, those guardrails conflict with state laws that permit broader NIL compensation and related activity.

The suit is described as a class-action brought on behalf of college football and basketball players, and it names multiple parties. Reporting indicates the NCAA and the “Power Four” conferences are among the defendants, along with the College Sports Commission (CSC), the organization charged with administering or enforcing aspects of the NIL and revenue-sharing rules that emerged from the settlement era.

The legal fight comes after the NCAA has already been forced to change major parts of how it treats athlete compensation. The House v. NCAA settlement led to significant back-pay terms and formally opened the door to schools directly sharing revenue with athletes, but it also left unresolved questions about how far states’ NIL regimes can influence the national rules that govern Division I athletics. This new lawsuit appears designed to push courts to treat those state NIL frameworks as requiring different outcomes.

If courts accept the plaintiffs’ arguments, the consequences could ripple beyond a single payment mechanism. College recruiting strategies often hinge on how quickly programs can align resources with talent, and revenue-sharing limits are one of the few remaining structured constraints on pay-related spending. A ruling that removes or narrows the cap could alter how universities budget for athlete compensation, what athletes expect when evaluating schools, and how conferences coordinate (or fail to coordinate) compensation rules across member institutions.

For now, the case is at an early stage, and courts may address threshold questions before reaching the merits of the antitrust claims. The plaintiffs’ demand for triple damages also underscores that they are seeking more than declaratory relief, which can raise the stakes for defendants if a path opens to class-wide recovery. What to watch next is whether the court narrows the scope to particular sports, particular time periods, or particular parts of the compensation structure.

The broader point for college football is that the compensation landscape is still being litigated in parallel, even after sweeping changes from the last wave of settlements and rules. This new filing suggests that the “new era” for athlete pay remains contested, with state-by-state NIL policy, federal antitrust doctrine, and the NCAA’s role in coordinating Division I economics still colliding in courtrooms across the country.