A prominent athletics director believes a lawsuit argued in California could be a catalyst to produce a “new wave of conference realignment.” But it also could be a fascinating disaster, and the SEC would be all in.

The last wave of conference realignment began about 15 years in the search of increased revenue. Now this possibility should get the attention of fans and administrators, wrote Dennis Dodd of CBS Sports.

The trial for Alston vs. NCAA, in a Northern California district court, seeks an injunction against current NCAA scholarship limitations (room, board, books, tuition, cost of attendance). Dodd wrote that this is the mother of all pay-for-play lawsuits to date in that it basically seeks to end the longstanding “collegiate model.”

In their closing arguments last week, the plaintiffs suggested that conferences “permit the individual conferences to make their own determinations” in compensating players. In response, former Congressman Tom McMillen, the leader of a Division I athletic directors organization, said leaving such decisions to the conferences “would be the Wild West.”

The plaintiffs are led by a former West Virginia running back and a former California center.

Dodd explained that the SEC would conceivably be all in, willing to spend whatever it would take to compensate players and win them away from rivals. Schools like Stanford and Duke would not be as into it.

Notre Dame athletics director Jack Swarbrick explained what it could trigger.

“It would be fascinating,” Swarbrick told CBS Sports. “It would be a disaster … but fascinating. I think there is a very significant chance that ruling would produce a new wave of conference realignment.”

The plaintiffs are arguing, since each school is held to more or less the same scholarship offering, athletes are being denied what Sports Illustrated legal analyst Michael McCann called “the full benefits of competition for their services.”

The NCAA has argued multiple times that paying athletes would turn off the average fan. Ratings continue to increase, while attendance has dropped since 2013, largely because of length of games and a lack of appeal to millennials.