SEPTEMBER 5: Despite apparently receiving legal clearance to do so, LSU did not add Wright and Harris to their roster by their initial deadline of midnight on Friday night, per Thamel, though he confirmed that both players are enrolled. The school only submitted 103 players on their current roster, leaving spots open for Wright and Harris to be added later in the year.
LSU’s hesitance may come from their uncertainty regarding their legal status and the rest of the SEC’s unanimity against professional returnees. Though Thursday’s injunction permits Wright and Harris to be added to the roster without penalty, LSU is not a party to that lawsuit, Thamel said on College Gameday on Saturday morning. The school is still evaluating their position and weighing the risk of future sanctions from the SEC, especially if they lose the appeal from the Louisiana case or the conference’s First Amendment lawsuit in Alabama.
SEPTEMBER 4: Players seeking a return to college athletics after signing professional contracts this year have won another legal victory, this time via an injunction against the NCAA and the SEC that clears the path for Dae’Quan Wright and Zxavian Harris to play at LSU this fall.
This is the latest step in an unprecedented saga that began when a federal judge in Colorado granted a fifth year of college eligibility to athletes from the high school class of 2022 in July. Litigation from dozens of players followed, including several who had already signed NFL contracts.
They received temporary restraining orders enabling them to join college teams, which were met by new policies from several conferences, including the SEC, banning such returnees and punishing schools for fielding them.
Athletes then filed additional lawsuits seeking to overturn those policies. First came a ruling in a Texas state court that effectively reversed the SEC’s ban pertaining to the athletes named in that suit. The group of Louisiana plaintiffs – including Wright and Harris, who both signed with NFL teams earlier this year – quickly amended their suit to include the SEC and commission Greg Sankey along with the NCAA. They received an injunction from Louisiana state court Judge William Jorden on Thursday barring the NCAA or the SEC from punishing schools who allow athletes who were named in the lawsuit to play, per ESPN’s Dan Murphy.
The SEC immediately announced its opposition to the ruling and intent to appeal. Furthermore, earlier in the day, the conference had already filed a lawsuit in federal court in Alabama against LSU – and specifically naming head coach Lane Kiffin – on First Amendment grounds, according to ESPN’s Pete Thamel.
The suit alleges that the school was undermining the SEC’s “organizational purpose and core values” by permitting professional athletes to return to their athletics programs. Essentially, the SEC is arguing that LSU is forcing the conference to associate with their actions that run contrary to policies that were agreed to by every member institution, including LSU. (LSU voted in favor of the SEC’s original ban against professional returnees but abstained from the vote on instituting punishments.) The conference contends that LSU’s defiance of the conference-wide ban constitutes a violation of their First Amendment right to expressive association.
LSU president Wade Rousse, who is now operating between the competing interests of the SEC and his own school’s football program, issued a statement on Friday saying that the university will “carefully review the court’s order and continue to work constructively with the SEC and NCAA as this matter moves forward.”
These legal cases will continue to play out, and though the courts have moved swiftly in recent weeks, they are quite literally running out of time. LSU kicks off their 2026 season against Clemson on Saturday night. Wright practiced twice with LSU this week and said he is “definitely prepared” to play this weekend, though Harris will not be available until a September 19 matchup with Ole Miss, where he and Wright played under Kiffin last year.
There was some doubt that the LSU-Clemson game would even take place, according to Yahoo Sports’ Ross Dellenger. Clemson’s general counsel informed this week his LSU counterpart that the participation of players who signed with NFL teams could breach the game contract between the two schools. Clemson still intends to travel to Baton Rouge and play on Saturday, but noted their stance against professional returnees in accordance with the NCAA, the SEC, and the ACC. In a rare break from the rest of this situation, no legal action is expected from Clemson at this time.
However, Dellenger notes another technicality that could be an issue: schools are required to submit their 105-man rosters by midnight local time one day before their first game. For LSU, that is midnight on Friday night. The school has not yet added Wright or Harris to their rosters, though Thursday’s ruling out of Louisiana should enable them to do so. Furthermore, an SEC bylaw adopted in April leaves the door open for players to be added to the roster during the season as long as there is a spot available and those players were already enrolled by the first game. Wright and Harris have already signed with LSU; presumably, they are already enrolled and will remain eligible to be added to the roster at a later date if that does not happen on Friday night.
All eyes will be on Baton Rouge on Saturday night. Wright could become the first player to play in college after signing an NFL contract. At the moment, neither the NCAA nor the SEC has any recourse against Kiffin or LSU should they field Wright, though future legal decisions could change that.
Though this case affects a relatively small group of athletes, only a handful of which are football players who are generally unlikely to have significant NFL careers, its symbolic impact on the landscape of college athletics cannot be understated. The NCAA and its conferences have historically enjoyed wide latitude to govern collegiate athletics as they see fit, but recent years have seen a mounting number of legal decisions go against the institutions in favor of players’ ability to transfer schools and receive payment for their services. Another cascade of losses for the NCAA will further erode their ability to set their own policies and threaten their sovereignty over college sports.
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