The NCAA dealt a blow to college underclassmen testing the draft process when it decided to enforce an existing rule Friday that would penalize them for playing games in the Chicago pre-draft camp.

Under the rule, players who participate in the games at the NBA draft camp June 5-8 could have to sit a game-for-game penalty the following season, meaning for every game played at the draft camp the player would have to sit one game in the ensuing college season. Invited players in the past have participated in at least three games, possibly four, in the NBA draft camp.

But the NBA and underclassmen considering returning to school were caught off guard by the decision to enforce this rule.

"That's horrible," Stanford junior Casey Jacobsen said Monday. "Then I guess I can't play. But I want NBA teams to know that I can't play because if I do I don't want to be suspended for the Preseason NIT if I return. This just made up my mind about playing in Chicago."

NCAA spokesperson Jane Jankowski said there was concern about competitive equity being gained by players who play in the games. She said the rule came to the attention of the student-athlete reinstatement committee when reviewing a case this past academic year. The committee needed to decide how to address the problem. The NCAA let its membership know of this latest enforcement through a legislative services column in the NCAA News, released Monday.

The article states, "At such camps, official score is kept, team rosters are predetermined, and team uniforms are used. As a result, basketball student-athletes who participate in such organized competition at pre-draft camps may become ineligible for any further intercollegiate competition in the sport of basketball. As a condition of reinstatement of their eligibility, student-athletes who participated in such pre-draft camps may be withheld from a certain number of contests in the following academic year, even if they avail themselves of the exception set forth in Bylaw 12.2.4.2.1."

If this rule had been enforced last season, players like Arizona's Jason Gardner, USC's Sam Clancy and Kentucky's Keith Bogans would have been suspended for the first three games of this season. That would have meant Gardner would have missed Arizona's two games in the Coaches vs. Cancer Classic. If that had occurred, Arizona might not have beaten Maryland and Florida to open the season and maybe wouldn't have had as surprising a start to the 2001-02 season.

Gardner played poorly in Chicago and was told he wouldn't be drafted. He returned to school. Without playing in Chicago he might not have received an accurate read on his draft status.

The same rules still apply when it comes to expenses for Chicago and any other workout. Underclassmen still have to pay their own way if they expect to be eligible when they return to college. But Jankowski said this would also be reviewed because players are knowingly committing a violation, even though they might plan on repaying the money. The student-athlete reinstatement committee will take this into account when reviewing any players' request to return to college.

Marty Blake, who is the director of scouting for the NBA and handles the invitations for Chicago, said he was unaware of this rule Monday. He said the NBA advisory committee would have to discuss it next Monday when it hands out invitations after getting the official list of early entrants later this week. But a few NBA scouts contacted Monday said they didn't think any player would risk giving up three games next season in college by playing in essentially three pickup games in Chicago next month.

"It's almost to the point that if you put your name in the draft then you should just go through with it," said Ball State coach Tim Buckley, whose star player Theron Smith entered the draft but planned on gauging his draft status in Chicago next month. "I made him aware of this Monday morning. The whole point of going to Chicago was to see if he was good or not good enough. Now how can you make that decision."

Wyoming's Uche Nsonwu-Amadi was planning on going to Chicago for the same reasons as Smith. Wyoming coach Steve McClain said Nsonwu-Amadi doesn't have an invitation yet but if one comes he won't play in the games.

"He might work out but he's not going to play in the games," McClain said. "He has no choice now. One of the reasons guys declare is to get to Chicago and help themselves for the next year. But that's taken away from them now. It's unfair to do this less than a month before Chicago."

Andy Katz is a senior writer at ESPN.com.