The Best Players Still Fighting to Play This Season

The spring portal is closed. The players who can still change a roster in October are not choosing a school. They are trying to get a fifth season the NCAA says they already used.

In June, Division I adopted a five-seasons-in-five-years model. It starts with full-time enrollment or the year after a player turns 19, whichever comes first. The NCAA did not give that year to the high school class of 2022 if those players had already completed four seasons. That class sued. Some won temporary injunctions. Several of those injunctions have already been stayed or dissolved. A month from the opener, the useful list is the players who have a school, a case, and a real stat line.

Keyshawn Hall, St. John’s Hall is the scorer. At Auburn he averaged 19.3 points, 7.1 rebounds, and 2.6 assists, shot 37.9% from three, and made third-team All-SEC. He has been a first option at every stop since George Mason: 16.6 and 8.9 there, then a 40-point game at UCF, then Auburn. He committed to St. John’s on August 26.

He is not cleared. An Ohio injunction that covered his class was stayed, and on October 2 an Ohio appeals court reversed the underlying ruling. Hall moved his case to New York and was granted a temporary restraining order the same day the Ohio ruling came down. St. John’s has the roster spot. The floor is still a judge’s problem. If the TRO holds, Rick Pitino gets a 19-point wing in October. If it does not, the commitment is a name on a release.

Cade Tyson, Minnesota

Tyson is the shooter, and he is already back in the building. He led Minnesota at 19.6 points per game last season after stops at Belmont and North Carolina. He is a named plaintiff in Wisne v. NCAA. A Colorado judge granted that class an injunction in July. The Tenth Circuit stayed it in August. Oral arguments are October 13.

Niko Medved said on September 8 that Tyson had rejoined the program and was practicing. He is still ineligible. Minnesota opens the regular season November 2, with exhibitions on October 15 and October 23. If the stay is lifted, the Gophers get their leading scorer back on a roster that was already built around portal guards. If it is not, they have been practicing with a player they cannot use.

Tamin Lipsey, Malik Reneau, Tre White

This is the group that currently has a path. On September 23, an Indiana judge granted a preliminary injunction to nearly 90 athletes. The headline names were Iowa State’s Tamin Lipsey, Miami’s Malik Reneau, and Kansas’ Tre White. The NCAA is expected to appeal.White is the cleanest offensive add of the three. He averaged 13.5 points and 6.7 rebounds at Kansas and shot over 40% from three. Lipsey is the point guard Iowa State already knows. Reneau is a physical forward Miami can use immediately. None of this is final. An injunction is not a season. It is a head start, and the NCAA has appealed or stayed almost every one of these so far.

Roddy Gayle, Michigan

Gayle won his own case. On September 24 a New York judge granted him a preliminary injunction, not just a temporary order, for a fifth year at Michigan. He averaged 7.3 points in 21 minutes off the bench for the national champions. Michigan expects him to start if the ruling holds. The judge still wants a formal order within 30 days, and the NCAA can appeal. He is the closest thing on this list to a player who is actually in the rotation.

Mark Mitchell, Seth Trimble, Skyy Clark

These three had cover and lost it on October 2. A Kentucky Court of Appeals dissolved the temporary injunction that had been the basis for their eligibility. Mitchell is the Missouri forward. Trimble is the Louisville guard. Clark is the LSU guard who averaged 11.5 points, 2.3 rebounds, and 2.0 assists at UCLA and shot 42.7% from three.Clark had committed to LSU in August and, as of October 2, was still being treated as eligible under a separate California injunction. The Kentucky ruling does not automatically end that. It does mean the Kentucky plaintiffs need another filing, in their home states, before November. CBS reported that is the expected next step. They are still trying to play. They are not currently covered by the order they were using.

What a jump actually requires

A fifth year only matters if the player gets on the floor before the league schedule starts. Hall changes St. John’s offense if the New York order survives. Tyson changes Minnesota’s if the Tenth Circuit lifts the stay on October 13. White, Lipsey, and Reneau are the Indiana group, and that injunction is the one the NCAA has to knock down. Gayle is the one who has already won a hearing. Mitchell, Trimble, and Clark are back in line.

None of them are in the portal. The schools are picked. The season is the variable.