Steve Sarkisian addresses Cole Hutson’s eligibility lawsuit

On Friday, former Texas Longhorns offensive lineman Cole Hutson filed a lawsuit against the NCAA in Travis County seeking immediate injunctive relief for a fifth season of eligibility after the implementation of the five-for-five eligibility model that does not apply to athletes like Hutson from the 2022 recruiting class.

In a press conference at the THCSA convention on Sunday in Houston, Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian addressed Hutson’s lawsuit.

“With Cole’s situation, obviously we’re monitoring it, and I don’t know where it’s going to go. We’ve all seen over the past few years there’s been a lot of lawsuits that have been filed and piggybacking off of other lawsuits, so on and so forth,” Sarkisian said.

It’s important acknowledgement from Sarkisian and one that helps explain the timing of the lawsuit. As other former players like Jordan Pope and Chendall Weaver have joined lawsuits around the country, Hutson’s filing comes in the wake of an Ohio court issuing an injunction last week to allow 15 basketball players to return to college to compete this fall.

Hutson filed his lawsuit the following day.

“Defendant’s arbitrary application of this bylaw to plaintiff unfairly limits the number of games he can participate in during his five-year eligibility window, restrains his ability to further develop, restrains his ability to earn scholarship money as a student athlete in pursuit of his Master’s Degree, and restrains his ability to earn money through the use of his name, image, and likeness (NIL),” the suit reads.

According to Inside Texas, the lawsuit indicates that the 6’5, 308-pounder has a roster spot available thanks to the SEC increasing the number of football scholarships from 85 to 105 this year.

“Cole’s a guy with a lot of experience, played a lot of football for us, and he’s a guy that unfortunately didn’t get drafted, and so he puts himself in a bit of a different situation than maybe most guys that got done playing their fourth year in college. So we’ll see what that looks like and see where it goes,” Sarkisian said.

One potential complicating factor for Hutson is that he participated in a rookie minicamp with the Dallas Cowboys after the 2026 NFL Draft.

At Texas, Hutson made 48 appearances with 23 starts for the Longhorns over his four-year career. As a freshman in 2022, Hutson started all 13 games at right guard before serving in a reserve role over the next two seasons. In 2025, Hutson began the season as the starting center before missing three games due to injury. Upon his return, Hutson started the final five games of the season at left guard as classmate Connor Robertson took over the starting center role.

If Hutson does receive the temporary injunction to play this season, he would likely compete for the open starting role at left guard, where Andre Cojoe and Western Kentucky transfer Laurence Seymore are considered the top contenders.