Chip Scoggins: Minnesota-St. Thomas basketball showdown exposes NCAA eligibility absurdity

Chip Scoggins, The Minnesota Star Tribune on Nov 8, 2026

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MINNEAPOLIS — The Minnesota Gophers played St. Thomas in men’s basketball Friday night for the first time in nearly a century, and that wasn’t even the most unusual part of the festivities.

One player sat on the bench in street clothes, unable to play because of a court decision.

Another player in the exact same predicament was able to play because of a court decision.

You’ll need a jurisprudence degree to make sense of it.

“He just picked the wrong case,” Gophers coach Niko Medved said of his player, Cade Tyson. “If he had picked another case, he probably would have played, if we’re being honest.”

That oddity in an otherwise fantastic event brought another reminder of the screwy nature of college sports.

Tyson and Kendall Blue sat on opposite benches in the Gophers 76-62 victory at the Barn, providing stark symbolism for their legal situations.

Both players graduated high school in 2022. Both sought the same thing: One final season under the NCAA’s new “five-in-five” eligibility rule.

The only difference is they choose different legal paths in seeking a fifth season. Tyson joined a federal class-action lawsuit. Blue joined players in a state lawsuit filed in California.

A judge in Blue’s case granted an injunction clearing the way for him to play this season.

Tyson received an unfavorable ruling in his case, making him ineligible. He got handed another legal blow just hours before tip-off Friday when a federal appeals court ruled in favor of the NCAA.

The web of lawsuits and injunctions involving athletes vs. the NCAA are difficult to track and digest, but the gist is this: Tyson was forced to watch from the sideline while Blue got to play.

Welcome to college sports, 2026.

“The fact that Cade Tyson, who is the best kid and best teammate, has to watch Kendall Blue play is crazy to me,” Medved said. “The NCAA can fix this real quick if they want. Yes, I think it’s unfair. I think it’s a travesty what we’re doing. It’s bad for the game. It’s an embarrassment that some kids get to play and some kids don’t.”

Medved indicated the door hasn’t closed completely on Tyson, hinting that further legal action remains a possibility if Tyson and his representatives pursue it.

The whole situation is ludicrous, a season underway and teams across the country don’t know when or if players will be declared eligible by courts. And if they are cleared, will a decision get reversed that sends players back to the sideline at some point?

“None of us have been in this situation,” St. Thomas coach Johnny Tauer said, “but we all have dealt with curveballs that happen. You just adapt.”

Medved noted that these lawsuits will have “major ramifications” on conference standings and NCAA tournament resumes.

“I can’t even imagine what it could look like on the NCAA Tournament bubble,” he said recently. “There are teams out there right now who, [depending on] a decision that some local judge makes, could turn them into a Top 15 team or maybe not make the tournament. It’s awful for the sport.”

Both teams Friday are proof of that two-sided reality. With Tyson, the Gophers are much more likely to make the NCAA Tournament than without him. That’s not even debatable. He is a proven scorer and All-Big Ten-caliber performer.

Similarly, Blue’s return after a one-year stint at Nebraska improved the Tommies’ chances of winning the Summit League, which would give them an automatic bid to their first NCAA Tournament as a Division I program.

St. Thomas was picked second in the Summit League preseason poll, with Blue earning preseason first-team all-conference recognition.

The lack of uniformity in court rulings has fueled chaos and confusion and created a distraction from the action on the actual basketball court.

While Tyson’s status remains in limbo, his teammates allowed Medved to breathe a sigh of relief after pulling away from the Tommies with a late surge Friday night.

The long-awaited, much-debated I-94 showcase fulfilled the hope of providing our robust basketball community with a fun evening.

The energy inside the Barn felt different than a normal nonconference game. The programs are separated by four miles geographically but thousands of miles in resources, which puts the Gophers in a delicate position. If they win, people shrug. If they lose, people make fun of them.

Medved didn’t call it a one-and-done thing, but the game won’t be played annually either because the victory won’t help the Gophers tournament resume based on college basketball’s algorithms.

When creating nonconference schedules, high-major programs either want to play other high-major opponents or cupcakes. The Tommies are neither. Their profile as an excellent mid-major program makes coaches nervous. A loss would bruise egos (especially against a smaller program just down the street) and dent a tournament resume.

Medved didn’t have to endure that nightmare scenario. The only loss came earlier in the day in a court ruling that kept his best player on the bench.

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