RESOLVING THE LEDGER
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See the full story · 1 sourcesAug. 5—When Ambrose Marsh first joined the Eastern Washington football team, he pretty well knew that he wasn't going to play much that first year.
He wasn't alone. Running back Kevin Allen III, quarterback Jake Schakel, wide receiver Bode Gardner, offensive lineman Gavin Allen, to name just a few Eagles players, found themselves all in the same position in the fall of 2024: redshirting and playing a lot on the scout team.
"The coaches would try to throw us in," Marsh, now a redshirt sophomore cornerback, said at EWU practice on Tuesday. "But they knew we weren't really playing and they were trying to develop us."
All of those aforementioned players filled key roles for the Eagles in 2025 and are being counted on to step up again this season.
But unlike that class, the current freshmen at Eastern Washington and elsewhere no longer need to redshirt; under a new NCAA Division I policy, they can play right away.
That change has altered the nature of competition across the Big Sky this preseason — largely, players and coaches said, for the better.
"I think the five-for-five (rule) is great for college football," Idaho State fifth-year quarterback Jordan Cooke said in July at the Big Sky football kickoff weekend. "For just how crazy college football has become, it'll be nice that you just get five years to play and no redshirts, no players playing for seven or eight years."
The NCAA's new age-based model of eligibility, which it officially adopted in July, is intended to simplify what had become a system rife with waivers. Eastern Washington's roster contains a number of examples.
Running back Malik Dotson, for example, played two years of junior college in California during the 2021 and 2022 seasons, transferred to Eastern and played four games in 2023, the maximum allowed under the old system for a player to preserve a redshirt. So that's what Dotson did.
He played nine games in 2024 — his fourth playing college football — and came back for the 2025 season thanks to the redshirt rule. But in Game 1 against Incarnate Word, Dotson suffered an injury that kept him out the entire year. He applied for a medical hardship waiver, the NCAA granted it, and now Dotson is back for 2026.
Under the new system, Dotson wouldn't be allowed to apply for such a waiver.
"I would have been done," Dotson said.
Under the new system, students will be permitted up to five years of Division I eligibility if they enroll in college no later than the academic year after their 19th birthday. Essentially, athletes could play every game over a five-year period, whereas in the past one of those years had to be limited to a redshirt season.
Students who enrolled for this 2026-27 season could still fall under the previous rules or these new ones, but the new system of eligibility will be the only one available to current high school seniors when they graduate in the spring of 2027.
In contrast to Dotson, there is current EWU sophomore Bryce Smith. He graduated from Bellevue High School in 2025 and then, as a true freshman, played 11 games at safety for the Eagles last fall. Smith will be allowed to play four more full seasons without having to redshirt, since current student-athletes with eligibility remaining can choose either the previous or the new system, whichever is most favorable.
The NCAA will still make a few exceptions that could delay or pause an individual's period of eligibility. These include pregnancy, active-duty military service and official religious missions, so long as the student-athlete doesn't participate in organized competition for the duration of the exception. But that's it.
"I'm a huge fan of it," UC Davis head coach Tim Plough said of the change. "I just think that everyone was taking advantage of the rules in the past, us included, so guys were getting six, seven years, and it just felt like that's not what college football should be about."
Another positive to Plough: increased competition up and down the roster.
"It allows us to play the younger players without feeling like we're going to penalize them, because the only way they are going to be able to grow and get better is to get on the field," Plough said. "For a team that's trying to get to the playoffs, if we can play all 105 of our players and not feel like we're penalizing them, hopefully that creates more depth for our team and helps us save our veteran players."
Already it has changed the nature of practices for the Eagles.
"We've got a lot of young guys going pretty hard right now," redshirt senior wide receiver Cole Pruett said of a group that includes freshmen Bennett Juve, Giulio Bachero and Oliver Luebkert. "That's good to see. Just knowing that they don't have to redshirt, they can just play right off the bat. They're coming out swinging and making the most of every rep."
The rule change will almost certainly be challenged; already a federal court granted an injunction to allow another year for 2022 high school graduates who have already used up their four years.
And, as some Big Sky players pointed out, there are plenty of players whose careers included multiple season-ending injuries. Under the previous system they would have been able to appeal for a medical hardship, but they won't be allowed to do so any more.
"Honestly, if the five-year rule had happened when I first started, I'd be long gone and into my coaching career," Portland State wide receiver Terence Loville said in July.
But Loville, who graduated from high school in 2020 and appealed for multiple injury waivers during his now seven-season college career, still likes the new system.
"I think it's a more fair way for everyone to get the same number of years," Loville said.
Above all, players and coaches said, the chan...
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