But Ware may have broken a lot more than his leg in this Elite Eight game during the NCAA Tournament 2013. He may have also broken his scholarship and his family may be left to pay his medical bills despite helping to make Louisville millions of dollars, CBS reports. Despite the NCAA lifting the rule that barred multi-year scholarships for athletes, the NCAA leaves it to the discretion of individual schools to decide to offer one-year or multi-year scholarships. Louisville is one of the schools that opposed the multi-year scholarships. Every athlete has to have their coach or their school renew the free education after every year.
It would be a bad public relations move but Louisville can legally deny Ware a scholarship to renew his education and the school can leave the family stuck with the mounting medical bills. “Coaches arbitrarily can withhold or withdraw scholarships and there is very little an athlete can do to prevent that,” said ESPN reporter Jeremy Schaap. He said this during “State of the NCAA,” organized by Illinois Congressman, Bobby Rush.
There are other athletes whose horrific injuries cost them scholarships. Take a look below:
