The Pac-12 filed a lawsuit in federal court Tuesday challenging the legality of a “poaching penalty” included in a football scheduling agreement between it and the Mountain West signed in December.

With Oregon State and Washington State scrambling late last year to fill their 2024 football schedule in the wake of the Pac-12’s collapse, they came to terms with the Mountain West on a one-year agreement that added six Mountain West opponents to each of the remaining Pac-12 schools’ schedule this season.

As part of the agreement, the Mountain West included language that would require the Pac-12 to pay a fee of $10 million if a school left the Mountain West for the Pac-12, with escalators of $500k for each additional school.

“This action challenges an anticompetitive and unlawful ‘Poaching Penalty’ that the MWC imposed on the Pac-12 to inhibit competition for member schools in collegiate athletics,” the suit says. “The ‘Poaching Penalty’ saddles the Pac-12 with exorbitant and punitive monetary fees for engaging in competition by accepting MWC member schools into the Pac-12.