It appears the Shea Patterson situation is rounding the final turn and headed toward the finish line.
According to both the Detroit News and mlive.com, Ole Miss has officially responded to Michigan’s waiver request to the NCAA that Patterson be granted immediate eligibility. The argument being made by Patterson, who transferred from Ole Miss to Michigan in December of last year, to the NCAA is that Ole Miss displayed “egregious behavior,” including misleading recruits like Patterson and his family regarding the potential seriousness of the NCAA issues facing the football program, and thus the standard transfer year should be waived in this case.
It’s expected that a final decision will be made well before the start of the 2018 season.
Patterson had previously expressed confidence that his waiver appeal would be successful. Then again, it had also previously been reported that a decision from the NCAA was expected in late January or early February.
Earlier this month, it was reported that the holdup in the process was the fact that Ole Miss had not yet received from the NCAA documents regarding Patterson’s waiver request filed by Michigan.
A consensus five-star 2016 recruit, Patterson was rated by 247Sports.com as the No. 1 pro-style quarterback in the country and the No. 4 player overall on its composite board. After starting the last three games of his true freshman season, Patterson started the first seven games of 2017 before going down with a season-ending knee injury.
If Patterson is able to gain instant eligibility, he’d immediately become the favorite to win the Wolverines’ starting quarterback job.