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10  NATIONAL COLLEGIATE ATHLETIC ASSN. v. ALSTON 

Opinion of the Court 

effects in the relevant market.”  Id., at 1067.  Though mem-
ber schools compete fiercely in recruiting student-athletes, 
the NCAA uses its monopsony power to “cap artificially the 
compensation offered to recruits.”  Id., at 1097.  In a market 
without the challenged restraints, the district court found,
“competition among schools would increase in terms of the
compensation  they  would  offer  to  recruits,  and  student-
athlete compensation would be higher as a result.”  Id., at 
1068.  “Student-athletes  would  receive  offers  that  would 
more  closely  match  the  value  of  their  athletic  services.” 
Ibid.  And notably, the court observed, the NCAA “did not
meaningfully dispute” any of this evidence.  Id., at 1067; see 
also Tr. of Oral Arg. 31 (“[T]here’s no dispute that the—the 
no-pay-for-play rule imposes a significant restraint on a rel-
evant antitrust market”).

The district court next considered the NCAA’s procompet-
itive justifications for its restraints.  The NCAA suggested
that  its  restrictions  help  increase  output  in  college  sports 
and maintain a competitive balance among teams.  But the 
district  court  rejected  those  justifications,  D.  Ct.  Op.,  at 
1070, n. 12, and the NCAA does not pursue them here.  The 
NCAA’s only remaining defense was that its rules preserve 
amateurism,  which  in  turn  widens  consumer  choice  by
providing a unique product—amateur college sports as dis-
tinct  from  professional  sports.    Admittedly,  this  asserted
benefit accrues to consumers in the NCAA’s seller-side con-
sumer market rather than to student-athletes whose com-
pensation  the  NCAA  fixes  in  its  buyer-side  labor  market. 
But, the NCAA argued, the district court needed to assess 
its restraints in the labor market in light of their procom-
petitive benefits in the consumer market—and the district
court agreed to do so.  Id., at 1098. 

Turning to that task, the court observed that the NCAA’s
conception  of  amateurism  has  changed  steadily  over  the 
years.  See id., at 1063–1064, 1072–1073; see also supra, at 
3–7.  The court noted that the NCAA “nowhere define[s] the