SRB2 - Gamecube Controller Issue

Hello all! First off, I am new here and a huuuge fan of Sonic Robo Blast 2. Lowkey, it's one of the best Sonic games of all time imo, fan game or official release. To me it fills the empty gap that the Saturn era left us. I feel like this was the game we were supposed to get when the Saturn launched and I honestly try and convince myself that it did exist in 1995 or whatever. (Yeah I know it sounds crazy) Anyways onto my issue.

So I have two gamecube controllers (usb) that I use for games I play via steam, My switch, Origin, etc. Both of them have never had any issues with any games before. For SRB2 though its different. I go to the options to change to the controller and it does recognize its there. However when I click on it to enable, I get a message that says "This gamepad is used by another player. Reset the Gamepad for that player first. (Press a Key)"

Anyways, i've tried googling around and doing other stuff like running as admin. Does anyone have any ideas on what to do to fix this?! Or anyone else had the same issue? Please any help would be awesome!!! It's so frustrating because this game is amazing and I want to use a controller so bad. Worst case scenario I guess I could buy a new controller if this is just something I can't fix...