I’m not asserting that the deserving student has an actionable claim on the spot.
Rather, I am claiming that the cheater negated the leveling effect of the standardized test in order to enhance their chances of being deemed a “deserving student”, thereby laying claim to an undeserved spot in the student body.
Fraud is defined as “an intentional misrepresentation of material existing fact made by one person to another with knowledge of its falsity and for the purpose of inducing the other person to act, and upon which the other person relies with resulting injury or damage.” The damage is to the university - which depends on its claim to a fair and impartial admissions system as a supporting leg to any claim of excellence they can make.
The fact that universities have done damage to their ability to claim excellence on their own notwithstanding, I see this as meeting the legal definition of fraud. You may disagree, of course.
That could be a potential claim. I suspect they have no legal options here unless they first expel the students who were involved in this scheme. Their failure to do so is very telling, since it suggests that the students are legitimate, active members of the student body who probably should have been admitted on their merits in the first place.