re: So, who showed their arse after the Michigan loss?

Eh, the movement against the NCAA in the courts has been brewing over a generation. People think of caselaw as something like spoken from God but it's largely just a combination of petty factional alignment, ideological commitments, and being a wind vane of public opinion.

I'd liken what has happened with the NCAA conception of amateurism in the courts to gay marriage. For decades, the courts mostly stayed on the sidelines on the issue or defer to the states but then public opinion moved so favorably in one direction that they take a case made for the justices to riff on and make what was obvious also legal. That's essentially how Obergefell and Alston worked out.

Obergefell offered an opportunity to rule on something that is ideological consensus between the prevailing camps - the federal governments right to protect privacy - that also fits within the prevailing social temperament that we stay out of each other's business and let people be happy insofar it doesn't negatively impact others.

Alston is similar in that it allowed for athletic amateurism to be viewed through a free market economy lens that is broadly a cross-party consensus but it also allowed them to rule in favor of something that was already a popularly held opinion that the players deserve more than just a scholarship when they play sports that generate billions for learning institutions and commercial interests each year.