NCAA releases guidance around JUCO eligibility waiver

The NCAA released guidance Thursday to its membership around the eligibility waiver it issued in December, allowing athletes who attended and competed at a non-NCAA school for one or more years to remain eligible to compete in the 2025-26 academic year if athletes used their final season of competition during 2024-25.

According to the NCAA memo from December, the waiver extends an extra year of eligibility in 2025-26 to athletes who previously “competed at a non-NCAA school for one or more years” and otherwise would have exhausted their NCAA eligibility following the 2024-25 season.

The guidance from the NCAA Division I Board of Directors on Thursday reemphasized that and provided clarity on whether Division II and Division III athletes could move up to Division I by taking advantage of the waiver.

According to the guidance released Thursday, if an athlete has time remaining in their period of eligibility to use during the 2025-26 academic year based on relief provided due to impacts of COVID-19, they can return for another season provided that they used at least one season at a non-NCAA institution.

And if a student who previously attended a non-NCAA institution is currently attending a Division II or Division III school during 2024-25, they can be eligible to compete at a Division I program in 2025-26 if they were previously at a non-NCAA school.

The December waiver came in the wake of Vanderbilt quarterback Diego Pavia preliminary injunction against the NCAA in the U.S. District Court of Middle Tennessee. Pavia argued that the governing body’s redshirt rule involving junior college eligibility violates antitrust law. The ruling from Judge William Campbell allows Vanderbilt’s star quarterback to return for another season.

Typically, under NCAA rules, athletes are given five years to play four seasons. Recently, the idea of five years for five seasons has been tossed around as a possibility, but no formal proposal has been circulated yet.

Pavia argued that because the governing body counts junior college seasons towards NCAA eligibility and athletes cannot redshirt after they have played four years, NCAA rules violate the antitrust law. The former New Mexico State transfer also argued that this forced athletes to miss out on NIL dollars.

In previously filed documents, Pavia wrote that he believed he could earn more than $1 million in 2025 if allowed another season.