​SPOKANE, WA – FEBRUARY 21: Gonzaga Bulldogs head coach Mark Few shouts at a referee from the bench during the game between the Pacific Tigers and the Gonzaga Bulldogs at McCarthy Athletic Center in Spokane, WA, on February 21, 2026. (Photo by Oliver McKenna/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images) | Icon Sportswire via Getty Images Last week ended on one question: would a California judge do what Ohio, Tennessee, and Georgia judges already had, and grant the class of 2022 a fifth season they can actually use? That question is, unfortunately, still open. But three things happened since then that make this whole saga worth revisiting: 1) Gonzaga signed two new players off the back of state-level litigation in Ohio and Georgia. 2) a federal judge denied the NCAA’s attempt to slam the brakes on the whole thing. And 3) the appeals court above that judge set a clock that could finally decide everything before the season starts.The Terms You NeedClass of 2022: players who played four straight years of D1 sports and finished their careers in spring 2026. This class of players was denied a fifth year of eligibility once the NCAA’s 5-in-5 policy was made official; a huge problem because all of that the classes before them got five years to play a result of a returned COVID season and all classes after them now get as a result of the 5-in-5 policy itself.The Colorado injunction: a federal class action ruling filed in Colorado that grants every class of 2022 player in the country a fifth year of eligibility. It’s the broadest protection for these players but also the weakest one: it says nothing yet about whether that eligibility is actually usable and protected from retaliation by the NCAA if that eligibility is later overturned on appeal.“Ghost transfer” protection: shorthand for the court ordered reopening of the transfer portal for the class of 2022 players. The portal closed in April, before any of this litigation existed, and as it stands now in Colorado, a player not already named as a plaintiff in a state-level case (so, all D1 class of 2022 athletes minus the 70+ who’d already secured eligibility and protection in state court) can only return to their previous school, not sign anywhere new, formally or otherwise.The rule of restitution: an NCAA rule that gives the ghost transfer rules teeth. With this policy, the NCAA can force a school to retroactively vacate every win that a player appeared in, if that player received their competitive eligibility under legislation that is later overturned on appeal. Protection from this rule means a school can sign the player without that risk hanging over the season.The state-level court rulings: separate wins in Georgia, Ohio, Tennessee, and soon possibly California that go further than Colorado for the specific players named as plaintiffs therein, adding both ghost transfer protection and restitution protection on top of the fifth year of eligibility.Two Groups of PlayersSplit the class of 2022 into two g