The SEC says it won’t back down without a fight.
A Baton Rouge judge froze the conference’s new rule targeting former pro athletes last week and now the league plans to push back in court.
Commissioner Greg Sankey and the conference will head to a Louisiana courtroom Thursday morning to argue their case.
Until then they’re following the judge’s order.
“The order entered against the SEC and Commissioner Sankey is a temporary restraining order, not a final ruling on the merits,” the SEC said in a statement. “The SEC and Commissioner Sankey are prepared to contest the allegations in the plaintiffs’ petition at Thursday morning’s hearing and defend the SEC’s rights as a voluntary association to fulfill its mission to its member institutions.”
The league added it’ll review whatever the court decides before figuring out its next move.
What the rule actually does
Sankey and the conference’s presidents didn’t take this decision lightly.
The rule lets the SEC punish any school that plays an athlete who once signed a pro contract in the NFL, NBA or WNBA. A coach could sit out half a season.
The school could lose half its annual budget for that sport. Voting rights inside the league could disappear too.
Presidents and chancellors passed the measure by a 15-0 vote.
LSU chose not to vote either way. Before that meeting even happened athletic directors from every SEC school, including LSU’s Verge Ausberry, backed the rule without a single no.
LSU sits at the center of it all
No program feels this fight more than the Tigers. coach Lane Kiffin brought over tight end Dae’Quan Wright and defensive tackle Zxavian Harris from his old team at Ole Miss.
Wright got waived by the Browns. Harris was a full-time starter for Ole Miss last year in all 15 games before New Orleans signed him.
Now add Jack Pyburn to the mix. Tampa Bay waived the pass rusher Sunday after he topped every pass rusher in the league for preseason sacks. Pyburn spent three years at Florida then closed out 2025 with LSU.
He’s expected to sign with the Tigers if nobody else claims him first and he just joined the lawsuit as a fourth plaintiff.
Junior Tuihalamaka rounds out LSU’s newcomers with pro ties, though his path looks different. The former Notre Dame pass rusher never signed a pro deal. He picked up a fifth year of eligibility and committed to LSU on Aug. 21.
There’s a basketball wrinkle too. Guard RJ Luis Jr. got a temporary injunction letting him suit up for LSU this season even though he’d signed more than one NBA contract in the past.
The courtroom fight widens
Judge William Jorden isn’t just blocking the SEC’s rule. He’s also making the conference and the NCAA explain in court Thursday why these penalties don’t put them in contempt of an earlier ruling in the same case.
Attorney Tony Clayton represents several of the athletes suing.
“If Sankey shows up, I’d like to hear his argument,” Clayton said. “What gives him the right to anoint himself God and take these constitutional rights from these kids?”
Co-counsel Ryan Downton is working a similar case in Dallas and claims the SEC and NCAA are working hand in hand on this.
A Dallas judge signed his own restraining order last Thursday covering 41 plaintiffs including three players still on active NFL rosters. That hearing lands Sept. 11.
The numbers keep climbing everywhere you look. The Louisiana lawsuit started with 33 athletes signed on. A week later that count had jumped to 42.
The NCAA told its member schools in a Friday memo that eligibility challenges have piled up fast — close to 60 lawsuits so far, touching 322 former players, with 184 of them already cleared to play by a court somewhere.
A ticking clock before kickoff
LSU has to lock its season-opening roster Friday, just a day after the Baton Rouge hearing wraps.
The Tigers open at home against Clemson Saturday at 6:30 p.m. with a No. 11 ranking on the line.
Whatever the judge decides Thursday could shape who’s even allowed to take the field that night.
