When EA Sports recently revealed work has begun to bring back its annual college football video game, that news was met with universal praise.

That is until now.

Notre Dame AD Jack Swarbrick has just released a statement announcing the Fighting Irish don’t plan on being in the game until Name, Image and Likeness issues are worked out.

Here is the statement he issued on Monday:

“Notre Dame Athletics welcomes the return of EA Sports College Football, a video game series that has historically helped promote interest in college football. Notre Dame will not, however, participate in the game until such time as rules have been finalized governing the participation of our student-athletes.

“As those rules are developed, it is our strong desire that student-athletes be allowed to benefit directly from allowing their name, image and performance history to be used in the game.”

This is an interesting release to issue at this time for a number of reasons.

First of all, the next EA Sports College Football game is not expected to be released for several years.

Taking that into consideration, it’s hard to understand why Notre Dame needed to issue this statement now, unless the school is currently being approached by EA Sports in regards to assisting in the creation of the new game.

Either way, by the time the game arrives, there are scheduled to be many Name, Image and Likeness laws in place around the country.

If there is a delay in making the next EA Sports College Football, we may know which school will likely be blamed first.