While the NCAA doesn’t want Brendan Sorsby playing college football ever again, it looks like the Texas Tech Red Raiders aren’t done with this situation. Not long after Pete Thamel shared a report that the NCAA would be denying Sorsby’s request for eligibility for the coming football season, Texas Tech University President Lawrence Schovanec shared a statement firing right back at the NCAA.
According to Schovanec’s statement, Texas Tech intends to appeal the decision from the NCAA, which I don’t think is going to surprise anyone. I’m sure the NCAA was expecting that. The Red Raiders would like their expected starting quarterback to be eligible and it seems like they believe they have a case to be made here.
“Recently, the NCAA issued an initial ruling that Brendan is permanently ineligible to compete,” Schovanec said in his statement. “Texas Tech will be appealing that decision. We believe that given the facts and the context of Brendan's case, the NCAA's ruling should be reversed or modified. As a generation of college athletes face the legalization and rapid proliferation of sports betting in our country, gambling addiction is rising to the point of epidemic among college aged men in particular.”
Texas Tech’s president made sure to include the context of the sort of treatment that Sorsby has received over the past month or so and how the transfer quarterback has also been diagnosed with a related anxiety issue.
Texas Tech announces intentions of appealing NCAA’s ruling on Brendan Sorsby’s eligibility as the Red Raiders rally around their QB
Schovanec also took some time to highlight that the Red Raiders have several measures in place to help Sorsby, including clinical care, group therapy, individual therapy, monitoring of his technological devices, a custodian of his finances, and more.
Which is a lot. The Red Raiders are really doing what they can to invest in getting Sorsby on the field, if at all possible.
In his statement, Schovanec also pointed out how “the NCAA's own Chief Medical Officer has called for a "harm reduction approach" in dealing with problem gambling so that student-athletes can ‘seek support without fear of impacting their eligibility.’”
This fight isn’t over. Between the appeal that Texas Tech is raising with the moral arguments that they’re bringing up in all of this and then also the legal battle between Sorsby and the NCAA, there’s going to be more that comes of this.
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