In the age of NIL and the transfer portal, we see players flip their commitments and leave schools all the time. Alongside those moves have come allegations and suspicions of tampering.
While tampering has been somewhat accepted as part of college football, one school isn’t backing down. Now, there’s a lawsuit over another school poaching one of its star players.
Wisconsin Sues Miami Over Poaching of Xavier Lucas
Xavier Lucas committed to Wisconsin in 2024 as a three-star cornerback recruit and became a starter for the Badgers, appearing in all 12 games as a true freshman last season.
After his great freshman campaign, Lucas transferred to Miami. At first, nothing about Lucas’ transfer to the Hurricanes seemed unusual.
According to Yahoo Sports’ Ross Dellenger, however, Lucas transferred to Miami without even entering the portal.
This, Wisconsin says, directly breached a revenue-sharing contract that Lucas had signed with the Badgers. For that reason, Wisconsin is suing Miami over poaching.
NEWS: In a landmark moment in college sports, the University of Wisconsin has filed a lawsuit against Miami for tampering, and eventually poaching, a college football player under contract (Xavier Lucas), per documents obtained by @YahooSports.https://t.co/KVYafcAdm5
— Ross Dellenger (@RossDellenger) June 20, 2025
Dellenger explained that Miami knew Lucas had a contractual agreement with the Badgers but still persuaded the young corner to leave Wisconsin and come play for the Hurricanes.
“Wisconsin claims that Miami communicated with Lucas, ‘knowingly inducing’ him, despite knowing he had entered a contract with the school, something it terms as ‘intentional’ interference that ‘was not justified or privileged’ and caused Lucas to ‘breach’ his contract,” Dellenger reported.
As Dellenger points out, this is an unprecedented lawsuit that could alter the future of college football.
The June 6 House v. NCAA settlement ruling allows colleges to share up to $20.5 million with their athletes. This lawsuit, as Dellenger says, will enable colleges to enforce tampering clauses within the new revenue-sharing model.
Wisconsin released a statement regarding the suit to Yahoo Sports in which they said they “reluctantly” filed the suit and won’t take legal action against Lucas. The statement also says Wisconsin is “committed to ensuring integrity and fundamental fairness in the evolving landscape of college athletics.”
Dellenger also says the Big Ten is “backing” Wisconsin’s lawsuit against Miami.
Lucas’ attorney told Yahoo Sports that Lucas had requested to transfer in January but Wisconsin did not grant him access, which is why he bypassed the portal completely.
It will be interesting to see how this plays out, as tampering has received little scrutiny from the NCAA since NIL was legalized in 2021.
The new revenue-sharing model should allow schools to enter contracts with players that bind them to that university for a certain amount of time. In Lucas’ case, however, he still left despite Wisconsin allegedly reaching an agreement with him.
It’s not hard to imagine that under the revenue-sharing ruling, the NCAA and College Sports Commission will use this case as an example to shut down tampering from other schools and make an example out of Miami once the House v. NCAA ruling goes into effect on July 1.
