The NCAA filed a federal lawsuit against Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine on Friday, three days after he signed an executive order giving the state’s universities the option of allowing athletes who graduated from high school in 2022 to play a fifth year in defiance of the association’s new eligibility rule.

NCAA president Charlie Baker said the lawsuit, filed in federal court in Ohio, was an “extraordinary step” designed to prevent DeWine from taking an action that would make it “impossible for all schools to compete on a level playing field.”

Under the order, public and private universities in Ohio can allow the Class of 2022 athletes to play, even though the NCAA’s new guidance excludes those who have already played four seasons. The rule, passed in June, is the subject of multiple court fights.

“This Complaint seeks to halt a misguided attempt to give Ohio colleges and universities an unfair, unprecedented and unwarranted competitive advantage in stadiums and arenas throughout the country,” the introduction to the lawsuit reads. “College sports, like all sports, depend on participants following the rules. [DeWine] is attempting to give Ohio institutions a hall pass to break the rules.”

DeWine’s office said it was declining comment on the litigation. The NCAA suing a governor is rare but not unprecedented. It won a case in the early 1990s against then-Nevada Gov. Bob Miller over a law there that would have required the NCAA to provide more due process protections in enforcement proceedings.

None of the eight Division I programs in Ohio have commented on DeWine’s order, which was also touted by Lt. Gov. Jim Tressel, a championship-winning coach at Ohio State and Youngstown State. The programs include No. 4 Ohio State of the Big Ten, Cincinnati of the Big 12 and six schools in the Mid-American Conference.

DeWine’s move was the latest in what has become a daily digest of legal maneuverings that are creating new rules on a state-by-state basis.

In reaction to the governor’s move, the Ohio Supreme Court said it would step in and determine the legality of the executive order. As part of that, it paused an appeals court ruling in a case there that had declared the 2022 athletes ineligible. The court asked both sides to file briefs in the case, in which basketball player Filip Borovićanin is the lead plaintiff, by next Monday.

Baker said the NCAA did not believe the Supreme Court’s order did, in fact, declare those players immediately eligible to compete and said it would submit arguments in that case by Monday.

That case, like others around the country, is becoming more urgent by the day, as it involves football players, along with a handful of basketball players whose status for the upcoming season is in jeopardy. Among them: Gonzaga transfer Javon Bennett, Cincinnati’s MJ Collins and Borovićanin himself, who played in an exhibition against Tennessee on Thursday night after DeWine’s order put him back on the eligible list.

Another case in Louisiana involves basketball player RJ Luis, who has been granted eligibility by the court but not placed on the roster by LSU. The Southeastern Conference is suing the school in an attempt to make it conform to its own policy, which would not allow Luis to play.

The NCAA has long explained that it knew excluding the Class of ’22 from the five-year rule would cause those athletes hardship, but the decision was between them and the new class of high school recruits coming into college this year, many of whom would be displaced if the veterans were allowed another year.

Ultimately, the NCAA has argued it made its decision based on which move harmed fewer people.

The NCAA lawsuit goes through the history of the rule and the flood of legal actions that have come since. One of the original cases, a federal lawsuit involving basketball player Brock Wisne, is leaning in the NCAA’s direction, though victories there have only spawned more lawsuits in state court.

“The results of this second wave of lawsuits were mixed, with the NCAA winning some and losing others,” the lawsuit said. “But the lawsuits unquestionably destabilized college sports, with ever-more disruptive lawsuits challenging foundational rules at the heart of organized sport.”

During testimony in a similar case in Kentucky earlier this week, an NCAA attorney asked Louisville basketball coach Pat Kelsey why he was among those looking for Class of ’22 athletes when the NCAA rules forbid that.

“From a coach’s standpoint, every time the NCAA says something, we all shrug our shoulders and say, ‘Is that going to stand up? Is that a rule?'” Kelsey said. “We don’t think there are rules right now. That’s why we want guardrails, we want Congress to act, we want the chaos to end. Because nobody knows what the crap is going on. No one.”

The NCAA has long called for a federal law to tamp down on the lawsuits undermining its rules for hundreds of thousands of athletes across the country. The Senate has sent a bill with that protection — the Protect College Sports Act =- to the House, where its fate is uncertain in this election year.

Information from The Associated Press contributed to this report.