Murph's Turph: UNC's Reese Brantmeier, NCAA settle class action lawsuit over prize money
Murph we've got a big settlement here
Reese Brandmeyer settling with the NCAA
Walk us through just a brief history of Reese's case
Yeah well in 2021 when she was still in high
school she made it to the US Open won about
$50,000
In order to maintain her eligibility though she could only
accept $10,000 of it
So in 2024 when she was enrolled at Carolina she
sued the NCAA over this prize money case
Uh of course NIL had come in by that point
The case has gone through you know many iterations but
last year the judge certified it as a class action
case which you know increases the liability for the NCAA
if they were to lose
And now we have the settlement
Do we know any details of the settlement We don't
know any details about the settlement just yet
We do know that the judge has given the parties
time to work on the agreement and finalize it
This was certified as a class action lawsuit meaning that
other tennis players
Could join this lawsuit to try to get some of
their money when they compete in other tournaments
What does this mean though you know for potential changes
to the rules for other athletes moving forward We've seen
the NCAA settle a number of class action lawsuits in
the last couple of years
The most famous is the House settlement which cost the
NCAA nearly $3 billion
Almost all of these settlements have come with rules changes
and a financial
So I'd be surprised if this one doesn't follow suit
and also come with rule changes and a financial settlement
If you don't change the rules then tennis players coming
right behind Reese Brandmeyer would be able to sue under
the same you know same violation of antitrust that she
did
And so the NCAA will likely try to find a
way to get out of the continuation of all these
lawsuits
Considering how much money is at play here I would
imagine so many students are going to be
Watching this settlement can we expect the details of this
to be made public You know the details have been
made public in all these other cases the House settlement
case some cases involving volunteer assistant coaches
I would expect that we will find out the details
of this at least how much money the entire class
is going to get
Also I'll be interested in what happens to other individual
athletes right You know if you're a skier or a
track and field athlete a swimmer a bowler you name
it
You're facing a lot of the same rules that Reese
Brandmeyer and tennis players are facing about accepting outside prize
money
So how does the NCAA deal with all of those
other athletes as well Exactly
They've got to consider that
That's a big big thing at play there too
Murph
Appreciate it
Thank you
Thank you