How NIL is Rewriting the College Sports World

BASKETBALL

Joshua Crawly, section editor

Just a few years ago, college athletes were paying tuition to play college Basketball. Now, they’re signing contracts and negotiating deals while simultaneously sometimes making more than professionals. The world of Name, Image, Likeness (NIL) has changed the college sports landscape as well as rules surrounding the transfer portal. NIL allows athletes to make money from things like sales of their jerseys, sponsorships, and their face being on a screen. Players are profiting from more years in college now rather than turning pro because in a lot of cases, it tends to be more lucrative. The players now have the power and more control over their money and future than ever before. 

The days of high school athletes grinding for scholarships and having to go through several processes to transfer or move teams are long gone. Today, college athletes are signing million-dollar NIL deals, jumping from school to school without penalty, and many times earning more money than NBA rookies. It’s created a new era of player power that’s never been seen before for these student athletes and has completely flipped the power balance. 

Everybody pays attention to March Madness to some degree. The Cinderella stories every year make it worth watching to see smaller schools or just schools that get less recognition go on runs while slaying giants on their way. But the days of Cinderella stories may be coming to an end sooner than fans are ready for. Every time a smaller school makes a run, their team gets decimated by the next year.  

All of this creates a system of “free agency” in college sports. Players are rarely loyal anymore and are always going to follow the money. The transfer process used to require players to sit out for a year before being eligible to play for their new team. Players were also unable to profit from their name and image. Now, the transfer rules are gone, and players are instantly eligible after transferring. NIL money creates bidding wars between teams across the landscape. Bigger powerhouse schools that have more money and resources can poach players and offer large amounts of money wherever they want. Rosters are changing every single year without fail. 

This whole idea of money and the way it impacts athletes was highlighted this past year with the highly coveted AJ Dybansta committing to Brigham Young University (BYU). He was the number one player in the class of 2025 out of St. Sebastien’s high school in Massachusetts. He had offers from basketball powerhouses like Kansas and North Carolina but ultimately chose BYU who offered him more NIL money compared to the others. Dybansta made almost 7 million dollars from BYU before even stepping onto a court. BYU is an amazing school but there was a point in time where playing for a Kansas, UNC or Duke was an opportunity that nobody would pass up.  

“I love that college athletes are able to make money. I think it pushes them to have a reason to get better and fuel their futures,” said senior basketball point guard Christian Cooper. 

FOOTBALL

Alex Easton, staff writer

The age of college loyalty is over; the new age of NIL is taking over football and there is no way to stop. In 2021, Name Image Likeness (NIL) was introduced by the NCAA at the beginning of the 2021 sporting season allowing students to profit from their name, image or likeness which was against the rules in prior seasons. There were many theories that the SEC used to pay players before the NIL rule was introduced but that is a topic to be left alone for now. Recently, Indiana won their first national championship on MLK Day against Miami. Their win has significant impacts on how teams approach the transfer portal because after watching Indiana go undefeated with a team full of transfer players, every team can now treat themselves as contenders because of the portal.  

In the current age of sports, NIL has taken over college athletics. This rendition of the transfer portal has seen many large toss ups. Athletes with agents have been levying higher NIL contracts by threatening schools with leaving if they don’t receive what they want. In the month of January, Demond Williams a quarterback from University of Washington signed a NIL contract to stay for another year; but then the next day submitted a request to leave the school because he was tempted to go and sign for lane Kiffin down at LSU (Louisiana State University). This caused lots of uproars in the college football community. This situation challenged the problem most saw in the contracts whether they were just pieces of paper with a set amount of money on there or if they were legally binding because the University of Washington decided to take Williams to court for breaking their agreement. Everything ended up being sorted out with Williams being dropped by his agent and Williams returning to school. The introduction of NIL deals has flipped college football on its head with the transfer portal almost working as a free agency like in the NFL (National Football League). Yet this is only the early stages of NIL where it has rapidly grown into throwing millions at college athletes to play for a year and then barter for more money in exchange to stay. This is only the early stages of NIL but in few years’ time, NIL deals could reach into tens of millions of dollars, but only time will tell.  

Let’s back track a little to the 2026 National championship game, Indiana vs Miami, Number One versus number ten, David versus goliath. Most would assume that since Indiana was number one, their team was made up of lots of five star and four-star athletes, which this is very far from it. Indiana rostered two four star recruits this 25-26 season compared to Miami’s four five stars and two four stars; the rest of these teams’ players were made up of transfer athletes that were two and three stars. This game changed how teams look at their chance to make it to the playoffs. Once ruled by the top programs, the 12 team play off has given any team the chance to make their case to be in the CFB playoffs because of the ever-growing influence NIL has on the sports world.   

With the introduction of the NIL and transfer portal becoming a lot more apparent in the past few seasons of college football and the larger schools going after big recruit names, the question is if there even a reason to enter the transfer portal as an athlete at a group of five school. Most say no because the chase of being recruited to go play at a top program as a relatively unknown player would be a very large gamble upon yourself because if you enter your name into the portal, you would no longer be on your current team and most likely wouldn’t be able to return since you decided you wanted to transfer. This topic is very conflicting for most, because athletes who want to make it big could ruin their careers because they wanted to chase a bag that they wouldn’t get if they didn’t have meaningful tape. If they did get recruited to a large school, the chance they would go from being a focal point of the team to just another rotation player.