On the surface, allowing NCAA Division I spring sports participants another year of eligibility seems like a win-win situation for college programs and the student-athletes whose seasons – and careers in some cases – ended prematurely due to the coronavirus pandemic.
However, as University of Tennessee at Chattanooga softball coach Frank Reed pointed out a day after the NCAA Division I Council’s ruling to extend eligibility, there is another side. While all spring sports athletes can choose to take advantage of the ruling, seniors might have to do so with a cut in financial aid – or no financial aid at all.
“Leave it to the NCAA to throw it back on the schools instead of stepping up and making a hard-fast decision and say this is what we’re going to do,” Reed said Tuesday. “Now we have to make the decision.
“Some kids are going to be really happy about it, and some are going to be really bummed.”
Schools cannot cut financial aid for undergraduate student-athletes, but seniors who elect to extend their athletic careers will have no such protection. The NCAA, in its release Monday, said schools would be allowed to use money from the Student Assistance Fund to help fund scholarships for returning seniors.