Stephen Daley, Kellan Wyatt eligible as NCAA loses again

The NCAA wanted the appeals court to move faster. The appeals court said no, and the people who follow this case closest all read it the same way.

Pete Thamel

@PeteThamel

Good news for all the atheltes in the Indiana eligibility case, which includes IU defensive linemen Stephen Daley and Kellan Wyatt and Miami basketball’s Malik Reneau. Indiana Court of Appeals has denied the NCAA’s request to expedite, which means they are expected to be eligible for the rest of the year.

To see why this matters, go back to the start. Heading into 2026-27, the NCAA scrapped the old redshirt rule and most hardship waivers. In their place it put an age-based 5-for-5 framework: 5 seasons of play in 5 calendar years. Athletes from the high school class of 2022 were left out, even the ones who otherwise fit. Daley and Wyatt are class of 2022 guys who used up their eligibility in 2025-26, so they sued, along with a big group of athletes from other schools and sports. The case has 97 plaintiffs.

They won the first round. In September, Monroe County Circuit Court Judge Kara Krothe granted a preliminary injunction and called the exclusion of the 2022 class arbitrary, capricious and unreasonable. That came too late for the Western Kentucky game: Daley and Wyatt had to sit out the 38-0 win while they waited on her ruling, then were cleared to play Northwestern. On October 16 the NCAA lost round 2, when the Court of Appeals denied its emergency request to stay the injunction. Thursday's denial of the motion to expedite is loss number 3.

Zach Osterman

@ZachOsterman

The Indiana Court of Appeals denied the NCAA’s motion to expedite its appeal in the Stephen Daley/Kellan Wyatt/Sam Alexis case. This probably pushes the timeline more or less through the end of the calendar year. Good news for the plaintiffs. #iufb #iubb

The schedule is what makes this one matter. The NCAA's real goal was to get the appeal heard and decided while there was still football left to play. If the timeline runs about through the end of the calendar year, as the read above suggests, Indiana's 2 veteran edge rushers should be in uniform through the regular season and probably beyond it. If the Hoosiers make a deep run, losing Daley and Wyatt would have been a huge hole up front. Now that looks very unlikely.

Indiana football isn't the only program helped here. Sam Alexis is in the case on the IU basketball side. Pete Thamel reported that Miami's Malik Reneau and Iowa State's Tamin Lipsey are also expected to stay eligible. Wake Forest's Justin Abson is in this case too, and other beat writers were celebrating for their own players.

Henry Greenstein

@HenryGreenstein

Another positive development for Tre White, Chase Belcher, Clifton Thompson and company. The NCAA had filed a motion to try to speed up the timeline of its appeal. The Court of Appeals of Indiana has denied that motion.

One wrinkle: the order wasn't unanimous this time. Greenstein noted that 1 judge dissented, while the appellate court's earlier orders in the case had been unanimous. That doesn't change anything for this season, but the NCAA's lawyers will notice it. The appeal itself is still alive and could still go the NCAA's way. Even so, Daley and Wyatt now have more time on the field than the NCAA wanted to give them, and getting that time was the point of the lawsuit.