NIL
Bronco Mendenhall Discusses Roster Building Philosophy At Utah State
LOGAN, Utah – As a Group of Five program, Utah State football is forced to dig a little deeper in today’s college football recruiting landscape.
The transfer portal has become the go-to spot for teams seeking to fill a specific roster hole, while high school recruiting has taken a backseat for some programs. Bronco Mendenhall is approaching matters with a different philosophy as he aims to instill sustained success in Logan.
The first-year USU head coach joined DJ & PK on KSL Sports Zone to discuss the Aggies’ upcoming season.
“I intend to build this program predominantly through Utah high school players,” Mendenhall said of his plan to stabilize USU’s football program. “That doesn’t mean that it can be exclusively done, especially at the beginning, because we have to address roster needs as quickly as possible while we’re building the foundational element to sustain us.”
RELATED: Mendenhall Has High Expectations For His Players, Utah State Football Is No Exception
“We don’t have someone that’s watching college games, while many do,” Mendenhall said when asked about scouting current college players during the season. “We’re focused more on high school players.”
Instead of rolling the dice on players he is unfamiliar with in the transfer portal, Mendenhall’s staff focuses on those they have previously built relationships with.
“I really don’t ever want to take someone that’s more than one step removed from our program,” the Utah native said. “That means that one of my staff has recruited them, or that we ‘ve worked closely with someone else that has either coached them or recruited them, because of the risk that you’re talking about.”
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One trap Mendenhall tries to avoid falling into is focusing solely on a player’s on-field performance while overlooking their character in the locker room.
“The time frame is so short in the transfer market window, most default to just how they’re playing,” Mendenhall stated. “But man, the wrong person in the wrong culture can really set your team back. So we try to mitigate the risk through known. The kids that we did recruit, that maybe chose somewhere else. We try to eliminate the risk with knowns as much as possible. It’s a very unique balance.”
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Utah State kicks off the 2025 season on Merlin Olsen Field at Maverik Stadium on Saturday, August 30. Kickoff against the UTEP Miners is at 5:30 p.m. MT.
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Brian Preece is a KSLSports.com insider covering Locals in MLB and the Salt Lake Bees. Follow Brian’s Bees and Beehive baseball here. Find Brian on X, Instagram, and BlueSky at @bpreece24.
When Bobby Petrino returned to Arkansas after the 2023 season, his first task was finding a new quarterback.
In this era of college football, that also meant funding a new quarterback. For that, the former head coach leaned on his old friend Frank Fletcher.
The Little Rock-based businessman stepped up and footed a large chunk of the bill for Taylen Green, the talented signal caller Petrino identified to run his offense for the Razorbacks.
It hasn’t only been a transactional relationship, though. Over the last two years, Fletcher has been mindful of Green’s life after sports. Rather than simply handing the star quarterback a boatload of cash, he offered something few college athletes receive: personal relationship and mentorship.
“I had a wonderful two years with Taylen Green,” Fletcher said during Monday’s edition of Morning Mayhem on 103.7 The Buzz. “I was lucky that I happened to back a player that was that nice a kid and [had] great parents. I’ve learned a lot from him. I’m teaching him everything I know, and he wants to learn.”
Fletcher helped Green navigate the financial market by giving the QB1 homework, making him chart a series of stocks over a few months – something that could prove even more important after his subpar finish to the 2025 season likely impacted his pro prospects.
But it wasn’t just financial exercises. Fletcher turned the lessons into on-the-job training – especially when it comes to creative thinking.
After dealing with complicated, 15-page NIL contracts from the university, Fletcher found a way to work around the red tape.
“We had a one-page deal that Taylen’s dad looked at, that we paid him quarterly,” Fletcher said. “He was a direct employee of Fletcher Auto Group, and he advertised for our Honda store in Northwest Arkansas.”
Such arrangements, which align with the original spirit of NIL, allowed boosters to effectively pay student-athletes whatever they deemed the market value of the service provided. That changed with the House settlement that went into effect this summer.
Among other things, it introduced a centralized clearinghouse through which all NIL deals over $600 must be approved. Now, Fletcher can no longer bypass the red tape and unilaterally make deals with players like Green. His contract with the quarterback would still be subject to the “fair market value” requirement, hence why the original agreement ended in April.
The settlement also ushered in a new era of rev-share payrolls alongside NIL agreements that was supposed to cap football roster spending and effectively level the playing field. Boosters of many Power Four programs, however, have found loopholes of their own.
Creative maneuvering remains alive and well.
Peeling Back the Curtain
During his now infamous appearance at the Little Rock Touchdown Club in September, Arkansas athletics director Hunter Yurachek referenced a shady “third lane” in which other schools are operating.
He was confident in how the UA has adapted to the two primary “lanes” — revenue sharing and “legitimate” NIL deals — on the financial front, but the eighth-year AD has long been a vocal opponent of pay-for-play deals that were supposed to be eliminated when the House settlement went into effect over the summer.
Of course, that hasn’t happened.
Despite the revenue sharing “cap” being set at $20.5 million, which is distributed amongst all sports on campus, there have been numerous reports this offseason of new coaches being promised roster “salaries” well over that number — even before factoring out the portion going to men’s and women’s basketball, baseball and other sports.
According to The Advocate, Lane Kiffin will get $25-30 million to build his roster at LSU. After flirting with Arkansas, Alex Golesh will instead have close to $30 million to spend on players at Auburn, according to 247Sports’ Auburn Undercover.
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The above-the-cap difference comes from third-party NIL deals, which must be submitted to NIL Go and approved by the clearinghouse to keep everyone in the good graces of the College Sports Commission.
While people like Frank Fletcher used to do it simply for convenience, schools have been forced to get creative when finding workarounds to navigate Yurachek’s so-called “third lane” — which The Athletic’s Stewart Mandel and Ralph Russo pulled the curtain back on over the weekend.
Their reporting found that some have simply not reported deals, especially since the Power Four schools have yet to agree on enforcement rules, but there are also some seemingly above-board ways to fudge the cap with the help of collectives.
One such way, according to The Athletic, is by paying agents separately. In this scenario, a $100,000 deal negotiated by an agent taking a 10% cut would come out to $90,000 from the school to the player, which counts against the rev-share cap, and $10,000 from the collective to the agent, which doesn’t and also isn’t subject to the clearinghouse.
When collective employees are worried about a large deal being approved by the CSC, they have reportedly been known to verbally agree to a certain amount, only to split it up into smaller deals submitted throughout the year that ultimately equal the agreed upon total.
The Athletic also reported that at least one school’s collective is believed to have paid the entire incoming freshman class to avoid having to count it against the rev-share limit.
It’s worth noting that the UA doesn’t have an active NIL collective at the moment, as it cut ties with the Blueprint Sports-run Arkansas Edge in October. Sources have indicated to Best of Arkansas Sports that the UA has something else in the works, but no such announcements have been made.
Still, like Fletcher and its fellow SEC programs, Arkansas has room to be creative. Yurachek must be willing to navigate that “third lane” or risk the Razorbacks being left in the dust.
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Frank Fletcher talks about his NIL agreement with Taylen Green beginning at the 2:16:55 mark below:
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More coverage of Arkansas football from BoAS…
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College football free agency does not officially kick off until the transfer portal opens on Jan. 2, but planning for the eventful two-week period is well underway. Players are announcing their intentions as coaching staffs prepare a plan of attack. It’s a busy time for every college football program, but the intensity is amplified even more for first-year head coaches, like Kentucky’s Will Stein.
With every coaching change, there is significant roster turnover. You can expect some schools to change more than half of their roster as a coach tells the old players to kick rocks as he brings in new ones from the transfer portal.
Lane Kiffin was called the “Portal King” during his time at Ole Miss. The man has frequent flyer miles in college football free agency. One of his first hires in Baton Rouge was Eric Wolford. The former Kentucky assistant coach did not fix the Wildcats’ high school recruiting woes on the offensive line, but his intense style actually might help Kentucky this offseason.
You have to be a certain type of person to play for Eric Wolford. Not every LSU offensive lineman is gonna sign up for that. Kentucky needs offensive linemen. You know who is well acquainted with those LSU players who need a new home? Joe Sloan.
Kentucky needs five new starters on the offensive line. There are a few reserves from last year’s squad that may be ready to emerge as starters, but the Cats need players in the trenches. Plenty of Joe Sloan’s former LSU players will be available in free agency.
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LSU Offensive Linemen hitting the Transfer Portal
OT Carius Curne — A top 15 overall talent in the 2025 recruiting class who was evaluated as a guard, the Arkansas native started five games as a true freshman, splitting time at both left and right tackle. He showed plenty of potential and will be a hot commodity in the transfer portal. He has three years of eligibility remaining.
OT Tyree Adams — Adams earned a starting role at left tackle ahead of the 2025 season before an injury forced him to undergo season-ending surgery in November. The New Orleans native has two years of eligibility remaining.
IOL Coen Echols — Started the last eight games at left guard and played the third-most snaps on the offense. The former Texas A&M commit will be a true junior with two years of eligibility remaining.
C DJ Chester — LSU’s starting center in 2024 led the team in snaps, but was replaced by a Virginia Tech transfer this fall. He enters the transfer portal with two years of eligibility remaining.
OT Ory Williams — The redshirt freshman earned two starts at left tackle at the end of the season. He appeared in four games total and logged 150 snaps.
The LSU offensive line was far from a juggernaut for Sloan last fall. PFF gave the Tigers the worst run-blocking grade in the SEC after finishing at the bottom of the league in rushing yards per game (104). Even though the unit had plenty of imperfections, there are still players with plenty of upside and SEC experience who could find a second wind by following their old offensive coordinator to Kentucky via the transfer portal.
Texas Tech will begin its first full day in South Florida on Tuesday with a morning practice followed by College Football Playoff quarterfinal media day at Hard Rock Stadium, site of Thursday’s game against Oregon.
No. 4 Texas Tech (12-1, 8-1 Big 12) meets No. 5 Oregon (12-1, 8-1 Big Ten) at noon ET on New Year’s Day. ESPN will televise the game, with Joe Tessitore and Jesse Palmer in the booth and Stormy Buonantony and Katie George on the sidelines.
This will be the first time the programs have met in the Capital One Orange Bowl and the fourth meeting overall dating to 1991. It is also the first College Football Playoff quarterfinal in Orange Bowl history.
– TECH –
This isn’t isolated to mid-tier teams like Iowa State. Even former powerhouses are reeling from portal raids. USC, under Lincoln Riley, hemorrhaged 15 players after a disappointing 2025 season, including backups and starters seeking better NIL opportunities elsewhere. The Trojans’ losses exacerbate roster instability in a program once synonymous with West Coast dominance. Similarly, Florida State shed 25 athletes, UNC lost 15, and over 10 programs nationwide saw 20 or more departures, highlighting how NIL bidding wars amplify turnover at underperforming or underfunded schools. These exits often follow coaching changes or subpar seasons, with athletes prioritizing financial incentives over rebuilding efforts.
The fallout extends beyond regular-season rosters, contributing to a palpable lack of interest in the multitude of bowl games not tied to the College Football Playoff (CFP). With the transfer portal overlapping bowl season and NIL deals luring players away, non-playoff bowls have become exhibitions of depleted teams, rife with opt-outs and makeshift lineups. Players, now professionalized through NIL earnings, increasingly skip these games to avoid injury risks ahead of the NFL draft or to chase better opportunities via the portal, rendering many matchups unwatchable and irrelevant. This year alone, several 5-7 teams declined bowl invitations outright, including Iowa State and Notre Dame that also had a 10-2 winning record in 2025, signaling diminished prestige, while opt-outs have turned storied bowls into shadow versions of themselves. Viewership for non-playoff bowls remains robust in aggregate—Disney’s 33 such games averaged 2.7 million viewers last season, up from prior years—but fan sentiment and expert analysis point to growing apathy, with complaints that NIL and the portal have “demolished bowl season” by eroding competitive integrity. As one observer noted, these games hold “no interest” for teams anymore, fueling calls for reforms like paying players to participate or shifting the portal window post-bowls.
As the 2025 calendar winds down, the NCAA’s revamped transfer portal is poised to swing open on January 2, 2026, ushering in a condensed 15-day frenzy that closes on January 16, 2026, for most football programs. This single-window structure, a shift from previous dual periods to curb ongoing tampering and streamline chaos, includes extensions: Players from teams in the College Football Playoff national championship (set for January 19, 2026) get an extra five days from January 20-24, while coaching changes trigger separate 15-day windows starting five days after a new hire. Amid NIL’s financial allure, this upcoming portal period could accelerate roster volatility, with programs like Iowa State still reeling from pre-window announcements and others bracing for bidding wars.
Yet, in Texas—the epicenter of NIL spending—some programs thrive amid the chaos, leveraging deep-pocketed boosters to build fortresses against portal losses. The University of Texas (UT) boasts the nation’s top football NIL budget at $35-40 million for 2025, enabling net gains like edge rusher Colin Simmons from LSU and wideout Isaiah Bond from Alabama while minimizing outflows. Texas A&M follows closely with $51.4 million in total NIL revenue (football-dominant), adding 12 transfers like quarterback Marcel Reed despite some exits tied to NIL dissatisfaction. Texas Tech, spending nearly $30 million, turned the portal into a weapon with 15 additions, including quarterback Brendan Sorsby on a rumored $4 million deal, fueling a playoff push. SMU, raising $65 million for all sports via its Mustang Club, focused on retention bonuses to limit departures to just five, adding talents like edge Braden Carter and earning ACC buzz.
Contrast this with in-state rivals Baylor, TCU, and the University of Houston, where modest NIL resources expose vulnerabilities. Baylor ramped up to $15 million in NIL spending, adding 24 transfers to flip its roster, but still suffered heavy losses post-2025, prompting coach Dave Aranda to fight for key retentions like four critical players amid portal risks. TCU, also allocating around $15 million to football under Big 12 revenue sharing, balanced gains (e.g., experienced quarterbacks) with lumps from departures, reflecting the portal’s double-edged sword in a new era of $20.5 million caps. Houston, with unspecified but lower NIL figures, bolstered its roster with 15 transfers and 30 overall additions, yet faces ongoing portal needs after a 4-8 season, lacking the financial firepower to consistently outbid elites.
This Texas divide underscores NIL’s inequality: Wealthy programs like UT and A&M buy stability and stars, while others like Baylor and TCU scramble to plug holes, often becoming feeder systems. As the transfer portal window in 2026 looms, college football’s soul hangs in the balance and talk of reform is already in the air.
For over a decade, Dave Clawson built Wake Forest into one of the steadiest football programs in the Atlantic Coast Conference, crafting a developmental model that produced seven consecutive bowl appearances.
Clawson’s approach to making the Demon Deacons a fixture in North Carolina’s college football landscape was deliberate: recruit under-the-radar prospects, develop them patiently for two or three seasons, then rely on experienced upperclassmen to carry the program.
As the transfer portal and NIL opportunities reshaped college football, that model became harder to sustain. After back-to-back 4-8 seasons, Clawson resigned, citing a rapidly changing landscape and acknowledging he could no longer give the job everything it required.
Wake Forest suddenly faced a reset as a coaching change, roster turnover and evolving expectations left the program searching for direction. When Jake Dickert, former coach at Washington State, arrived in Winston-Salem ahead of the 2025 season, optimism was cautious at best.
What followed was one of the ACC’s most striking turnarounds.
In his first season, Dickert — the North State Journal’s 2025 Coach of the Year — restored stability and belief, guiding Wake to an 8-4 record and a return to bowl eligibility.
Capping off Dickert’s debut season, the Demon Deacons (8-4) will face SEC representative Mississippi State Bulldogs (5-7) in the Duke’s Mayo Bowl on Jan. 2 at Bank of America Stadium in Charlotte.
In their 2025 campaign, the Deacs tied for the most victories among all FBS programs in the Carolinas, underscoring the program’s rapid rebound. Wake Forest defeated two teams ranked at the time, including a road victory at Virginia (the Cavaliers’ only home loss of the season) and a home win that snapped SMU’s 20-game regular-season conference winning streak.
After back-to-back losses in September, Wake responded by winning six of seven games before closing the regular season with a loss at Duke; the Deacs finished 4-4 in ACC play.
On the field, Dickert leaned on a blend of experience and toughness. Graduate transfer quarterback Robby Ashford brought leadership to an offense that had struggled for consistency in recent seasons, while senior running back Demond Claiborne anchored the ground game and emerged as a physical focal point in key moments.
Defense again proved to be the program’s backbone. The Demon Deacons ranked sixth in the ACC and 38th nationally in scoring defense, finished top five in the league in total and passing defense, and did not allow a touchdown against either Virginia or North Carolina.
Dickert’s impact extended well beyond Saturdays.
Before the season, he overhauled Wake Forest’s recruiting and scouting infrastructure, assembling a 10-person staff dedicated to identifying talent and building depth in a new era of college football. The early returns have been promising.
During the recent National Signing Day, Wake Forest announced a 30-player 2026 recruiting class — the highest-ranked in program history — currently inside the national top 50. The class includes one four-star and 29 three-star recruits, signaling a shift toward broader talent acquisition and immediate competitiveness.
Dickert’s efforts were rewarded following the regular season. On Dec. 2, Wake Forest Vice President and Athletics Director John Currie announced that Dickert had signed a long-term contract extension.
“Jake Dickert has proven himself to be one of college football’s rising head coaches and one of the truly special leaders in the ACC,” Currie said. “He has galvanized our locker room, our campus, and our community. Coach Dickert is exactly the type of leader who inspires players, and he and his family fit seamlessly into the Wake Forest and Winston-Salem community.”
Dickert echoed that sentiment, pointing to long-term investment as central to Wake Forest’s direction.
“Our family could not be more grateful to call Wake Forest and Winston-Salem home,” he said. “Over the last 11-plus months, our staff and student-athletes have embraced a new process of being ‘Built in the Dark.’ When John approached me a few weeks ago about the university’s desire to further invest in our program, I was both humbled and energized.”
“This commitment ensures that our staff has the stability, resources and support necessary to continue elevating Wake Forest football,” Dickert added. “I’m proud of this team, our staff and our seniors who built the foundation for this new era, and excited for what’s ahead. There has never been a better time to be a Demon Deacon.”
While roster turnover remains a reality, Wake Forest’s trajectory is still heading upward. With a retooled staff, a revamped recruiting approach and renewed confidence throughout the program, Dickert has revived the Demon Deacons and positioned them for sustained relevance for years to come.
North Texas enjoyed a historic 2025 season, finishing 12–2 overall (7–1 in the American Conference) and cracking the AP Top 25.
The Mean Green posted the nation’s top offense (45.1 points per game), reached the AAC Championship Game, and capped the year with a thrilling 49–47 New Mexico Bowl win over San Diego State, the most wins in program history.
A key driver behind that success was true freshman running back Caleb Hawkins, who posted 1,434 rushing yards on 230 carries (6.2 yards per carry) with 25 rushing touchdowns, plus 32 catches for 370 receiving yards and four receiving TDs, 1,804 scrimmage yards and 29 total touchdowns.
He earned All-America and All-Conference freshman honors, national freshman awards recognition, and MVP honors in North Texas’ bowl victory.
However, shortly after, he announced his decision to enter the NCAA transfer portal, positioning himself as one of the highest-profile running backs available when the portal opens Friday.
On Monday, On3’s Pete Nakos specifically listed Hawkins among portal names being tracked and identified Texas as one of the programs showing early interest or appearing as a logical landing spot in that early intel.
Hawkins was a lightly-recruited three-star prospect out of North Rock Creek High School (Shawnee, Oklahoma) who signed with North Texas over offers from Emporia State and Central Oklahoma.
Texas finished the 2025 season ranked No. 13 in the final AP poll but failed to reach the College Football Playoff despite entering the year as the preseason No. 1 team in the AP Top 25.
Sophomore quarterback Arch Manning has publicly confirmed he will return to Texas for 2026, but the Longhorns face significant attrition at running back, with Quintrevion Wisner, Jerrick Gibson, and CJ Baxter all set to enter the transfer portal.
Texas has a clear need at running back, Hawkins’ proximity to Austin, and the program’s proven history of developing NFL-level backs, such as Bijan Robinson, Jonathan Brooks, Roschon Johnson, and Jaydon Blue, all point to Texas as a logical landing spot for Hawkins.
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