Opinion – NCAA 5-for-5 Rule: The effects of the five year rule on the college

The NCAA adopted its new 5-for-5 rule in June of 2026. The rule states that Division I athletes now have five years to play five seasons: eliminating red-shirts (medically and otherwise), causing a world of lawsuits and controversy.

A major grievance with the rule came with the notable exclusion of the Class of 2022. Lawsuits came in bunches, athletes argued that the class before them got an extra year for covid and the class after and all subsequent classes have five years automatically.

The NCAA won the suit upon appeal which meant they did not have to allow the Class of 2022 athletes another year. However, there are still many state cases going on with people filing different grievances, with some states even allowing players from the 2022 class to return to college.

The true danger of the rule came to a head when LSU’s coach, Lane Kiffin, recruited former professional players to their roster. While it was technically legal during the Class of 2022 eligibility wave, the SEC passed a rule that banned former professional athletes from playing and threatened to kick LSU out of the conference.

I think that there needed to be a change in the way NCAA eligibility was structured and regardless of the change, some would have disagreed. The 5-for-5 is a good rule on its face but was always going to come with some scrutiny.

With this new rule, the days of “eighth year seniors” and having multiple red-shirts are over. I think that in conjunction with the NCAA’s transfer portal and NIL rules this will be beneficial for the college athletes, especially incoming freshmen whose opportunity would have been taken by a much older player before.

Additionally, it encourages athletes to go somewhere that they will be able to play early on because they can’t just red-shirt their freshman year. Along with that, players have an exact timeline of when they will be out of eligibility and there aren’t any loop holes (once all the current court cases are over and there are only athletes who would have been in high school at the time of the ruling.)

It lays out a consistent foundation for all college sports and does not allow athletes to abuse the new NIL policies and spend an egregious amount of time in college.

My major concern is for those players who do suffer injuries that keep them sidelined for a full season. It is hard on players to not get that year back but with the transfer portal of today, if a team does not trust a player after their injury they can transfer to a “worse school” and still be a day one starter.

I believe the implications that it has are going to be major for the NCAA and college sports moving forward. I think that most of those implications will be good and overall it will benefit athletes and the programs with the new consistency in eligibility.