A Lubbock district judge is recusing from Brendan Sorsby’s lawsuit in which Sorsby is seeking eligibility for the 2026 Texas Tech football season.
District Judge Phillip Hays, a Texas Tech University and Law School alumnus, filed an order recusing himself from the lawsuit the Red Raiders’ quarterback filed seeking an injunction that would allow Sorsby to play this coming season.
Sorsby, who is currently ineligible to play for Tech after violations of the NCAA’s sports gambling rules, filed a 514-page suit on Monday, May 18, that was assigned to the 99th District Court over which Hays presides.
Tech ruled Sorsby ineligible shortly after learning of the NCAA’s investigation into his gambling and “requested to move forward to begin the reinstatement process to regain Mr. Sorsby’s eligibility,” the lawsuit states.
The suit requests a hearing to “be held no later than June 15 so that the Court has the opportunity to render a decision on his request for a temporary injunction prior to June 22,” the deadline for Sorsby to declare for the NFL supplemental draft.
Hays’ recusal means Judge Anna Estevez will have to appoint a judge to hear the case. Estevez presides over the 9th Administrative Judicial Region, which includes Lubbock.
After Sorsby’s legal team filed its case for an injunction on Monday, Texas Tech Athletics released a statement saying, “After finalizing an agreed-upon stipulation of facts between Texas Tech University, the NCAA, and Brendan Sorsby, the University has declared Sorsby ineligible for competition. Texas Tech intends to quickly initiate the reinstatement process.”
A statement Tech released on April 27 said Sorsby acknowledged having a gambling addiction. He voluntarily entered a 30-day inpatient treatment program that day.
Sorsby was a high school athlete at Corinth Lake Dallas before spending the 2022 and 2023 seasons at Indiana and the 2024 and 2025 seasons at Cincinnati, throwing for 2,800 yards in both seasons, combining for 45 touchdown passes. He transferred to Texas Tech in January and threw four touchdown passes in the Red Raiders’ spring game.
According to the suit, Sorsby began gambling as a high-school senior, making a short drive with friends to a casino near the Oklahoma border where he could gamble legally.
“What began as a seemingly harmless activity with friends quickly developed into an addiction,” the filing says.
It goes on to say Sorsby made small bets, typically between $5 and $50, on his Indiana football team to win or individual teammates to exceed expectations during the 2022 season, stressing that he stopped doing so in October 2022 when he was promoted after eight games from scout-team quarterback with no chance of playing to backup quarterback. While a scout-team member, he didn’t travel with the team and wasn’t privy to the game plan for the week’s game.
The suit states that Sorsby never bet against his own team or its players, never shared insider information with anyone else, and did not manipulate games.
“The NCAA’s own robust, real-time integrity-monitoring systems confirm this: there is no evidence that they ever generated a single alert or otherwise gave the NCAA any reason to question Mr. Sorsby’s betting activity before April 2026,” the suit states.
According to NCAA rules, athletes who wager on their own games or on other sports at their own schools can be penalized with permanent ineligibility. NCAA rules also prohibit gambling on any sports in which the NCAA sponsors a championship. For other wagering-related violations, including gambling on professional sports, the cumulative dollar value of wagers is taken into consideration in assessing punishment.
Since the 2022 season, the filing says, Sorsby has never bet on any of his other teams, including Cincinnati, in games his teams participated in, or on players in those games.
Avalanche-Journal sportswriters Nathan Giese and Don Williams contributed to this report.
This article originally appeared on Lubbock Avalanche-Journal: Lubbock judge, a Texas Tech alum, files to recuse in Sorsby lawsuit
Reporting by Gabriel Monte, Lubbock Avalanche-Journal / Lubbock Avalanche-Journal
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
