UNC field hockey players return to the team — how it happened

UNC Field Hockey is on the West Coast following an Indiana judge granting a preliminary injunction. Photo: Stock

Three North Carolina field hockey players are at the center of a growing fight over who gets one more year in college sports. 

Ryleigh Heck, Dani Mendez, and Sietske Brüning became eligible to play for UNC on Sept. 23 after an Indiana judge granted a preliminary injunction, according to court records cited by the Indiana Daily Student and Inside Carolina. 

The order covers 97 plaintiffs in Daley v. NCAA, which challenges the NCAA’s new ‘Five for Five’ eligibility system. 

The temporary order lets the three Tar Heels compete while the case moves toward trial. Reports said the NCAA could appeal or seek a stay. 

The dispute followed the NCAA Division I Cabinet’s approval of a new eligibility model in June. 

According to the NCAA, the new system creates a continuous five-year eligibility period tied to age and college enrollment; it does not guarantee every athlete five seasons of competition.  

It currently only applies to Division I and II athletes.

The transition did not add a season for athletes who exhausted eligibility by the end of 2025–26, including 2022 high-school graduates who enrolled immediately and played four straight seasons. 

That describes Heck, Mendez, and Brüning.  

UNC Athletics records show each played four consecutive seasons from 2022 through 2025 without redshirting. All three were pursuing graduate studies at UNC and did not base their claims on injury or another major life event. 

UNC Athletics records list Heck and Brüning on the program’s 2022 and 2023 national championship teams. In 2025, Mendez started all 23 games and recorded 15 goals and 16 assists. She started her career at Virginia in 2022.  

The three also belonged to the group briefly protected in Wisne v. NCAA, Inside Carolina reported. A Colorado federal judge issued a nationwide preliminary injunction for qualifying Division I athletes from the 2022 high-school class. 

On Aug. 21, the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals stayed that order during the NCAA’s appeal, making the three athletes ineligible again until they obtained relief in the Indiana case, according to the appellate ruling and the NCAA’s notice to member schools. 

Court records identify 97 plaintiffs in the Indiana case. The total number of similarly situated athletes nationwide has not been established publicly. 

The group is narrower than the full 2022 graduating class, principally covering athletes who began college sports in 2022–23 and completed four seasons by the end of 2025–26. 

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