On April 23, U.S. District Judge Claudia Wilken temporarily rejected the terms of the settlement in House v. NCAA, effectively issuing an ultimatum to the parties: fix the roster limits issue or risk blowing up the settlement. We have discussed the House case and the terms of the settlement in several NIL Revolution blog posts and Highway to NIL podcast episodes.
At bottom, Judge Wilken declined to grant final approval of the proposed settlement, citing concerns about the parties’ failure to implement changes to the roster limits (as the court explicitly requested during the final settlement hearing on April 7). Judge Wilken, however, acknowledged that the court continued to lean toward approving the settlement — but only if the parties modified the final agreement.
Judge Wilken’s five-page order[1] requires the parties to amend the agreement to mitigate the potential harm caused by these roster limits. Instead of rejecting the settlement outright, the parties now have 14 days to confer with their mediator and several objectors’ attorneys (i.e., those who complained about the implementation of roster limits) to modify the settlement accordingly.
During the April 7 hearing, Judge Wilken expressed concern over objections from athletes who claimed the new roster limits had led — or would lead — to them being cut from teams. The parties, however, pushed back against the objectors, arguing that amending the terms of the roster limits would jeopardize the months-long negotiations that produced the agreement. Now, agreeing with the objectors, Judge Wilken noted that this “is not fair to those class members.”
Judge Wilken also dismissed the parties’ arguments that changing the settlement at this late stage would harm the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) member institutions that had already started implementing the settlement terms, stating “[a]ny disruption that may occur is a problem of Defendants’ and NCAA member schools’ own making.” Judge Wilken continued, “[t]he fact that the Court granted preliminary approval of the settlement agreement should not have been interpreted as an indication that it was certain that the Court would grant final approval.”
Judge Wilken suggested one course of action would be for the settlement to stipulate that no members of the injunctive relief settlement class “who have or had a roster spot will lose it as a result of the immediate implementation of the settlement agreement.” Said differently, Judge Wilken strongly suggested the parties find a way to implement a “grandfathering” concept to roster limits, thereby assuring that current student-athletes who are on a roster remain on the roster going forward.
Following Judge Wilken’s order, the NCAA and power conferences released a statement: “We are closely reviewing Judge Wilken’s order. Our focus continues to be on securing approval of this significant agreement, which aims to create more opportunities than ever before for student-athletes while fostering much-needed stability and fairness in college sports.”
[1] In Re: College Athlete NIL Litigation, Case No. 20-cv-03919 CW, Dkt. 948 (N.D. Cal. Apr. 23, 2025) (“Order”)
