Court Opinion

ID: 9464020
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 23:23:30.283757+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:38:25.458169
License: Public Domain

BRIGHT, Circuit Judge,
concurring:
Although I have some doubt that the activities of the NCAA constitute “state *373action,” four other circuits have held to the contrary and I feel bound by those precedents.34
However, I believe an additional observation is warranted. In my judgment, the ruling of the Association visits the sins of the “fathers” (the University’s basketball coaches) upon the relatively innocent “sons” (the basketball players). The obvious injustice of the NCAA rulings indirectly affecting the athletes in question seems to reflect some degree of vindictiveness, not necessarily against the student athletes, but against the University of Minnesota, to punish it for the previous improprieties of the basketball coaching staff.
The University of Minnesota, we assume, retains the prerogative of dropping its membership in the NCAA although such remedy may be impractical in this era of college athletic competition, which through exhibition on television under NCAA arrangements produces financial rewards and other benefits for the member colleges and universities.
Although the rulings of the NCAA indirectly require that the University of Minnesota inflict upon the athletes in question punishment which seems grossly disproportionate to the offense committed by each of them, this court lacks the power in this case to redress the apparent moral wrong absent a constitutional violation.

. Rivas Tenorio v. Liga Atletica Interuniversitaria, 554 F.2d 492 (1st Cir. 1977); Howard University v. NCAA, 166 U.S.App.D.C. 260, 510 F.2d 213 (1975); Parish v. NCAA, 506 F.2d 1028 (5th Cir. 1975); Associated Students, Inc. v. NCAA, 493 F.2d 1251 (9th Cir. 1974). However, cases such as Jackson v. Metropolitan Edison Co., 419 U.S. 345, 95 S.Ct. 449, 42 L.Ed.2d 477 (1974) and Moose Lodge No. 107 v. Irvis, 407 U.S. 163, 92 S.Ct. 1965, 32 L.Ed.2d 627 (1972) could support a strong argument that no state action exists.