Judge Rules Pair Of 5th-Year Players Eligible to Play for Michigan This Season

Michigan’s football team might have some help on the way this season. A judge granted a temporary restraining order for former Miami tight end Alex Bauman and former Boise State defensive back Jeremiah Earby, a pair of student-athletes who are enrolled at Michigan and hope to join the team for their fifth season. Judge Julia B. Owdziej, based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, ruled that both players are eligible to play this season. She wrote on Tuesday that preventing them from being eligible would be "irreparable and severe," while the harm to the NCAA would be "negligible." A message seeking comment was left with the NCAA on Wednesday. A Michigan spokesman declined comment. The NCAA ‘s new eligibility rule is being challenged in multiple courtrooms across the country. Plaintiffs say the rule is unfair to the class of 2022 student-athletes, depriving them of the opportunity to earn money through NIL deals and revenue-sharing now flowing from schools to their athletes under the House settlement. Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine signed an executive order earlier this week giving the state’s colleges and universities the option of allowing athletes who graduated from high school in 2022 to play a fifth year in defiance of the NCAA. Under the order, public and private universities in Ohio can allow athletes to play, even though the NCAA’s new guidance excludes those who have already played four seasons. In a letter to the NCAA’s member schools, the governing body’s president, Charlie Baker, said Tuesday that DeWine "cannot legislate NCAA eligibility rules." "One elected official seeking to make their own rules for their own schools’ advantage is a terrible way to run athletic competitions," Baker said, while also pushing Congress to pass the Protect College Sports Act, a sweeping bill aiming to institute guardrails around how colleges pay their players and what those players can and cannot go to court to fight. The Wolverines, under first-year coach Kyle Whittingham, have started 0-2 in the Big Ten for the first time since 2014 and host Penn State on Saturday. Bauman and Earby would potentially give them a boost. The 6-foot-5, 250-pound Bauman had 18 receptions for 166 yards and a touchdown last season for the Hurricanes after playing for three seasons at Tulane. He has 63 career catches for 610 yards and 13 touchdowns. The 6-2, 186-pound Earby was an All-Mountain West Second Team player after making four interceptions last season at Boise State, where he was a two-year starter. He spent his first two seasons at California. Reporting by The Associated Press.