By John Crawford

MIRAMAR BEACH, Fla. — Along a carpeted hallway within the Sandestin Hilton, Brian Kelly is mid-conversation when a man interjects. “Hey,” the man said toward the LSU football coach, “you asked great questions today during our presentation!”

The man continued onward, leading a team of about a half-dozen people through the lobby of this place. They are members of the Deloitte leadership and implementation team operating college sports’ new NIL clearinghouse dubbed “NIL Go.”

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Presenting in front of SEC coaches here on Tuesday — a question-and-answer session too — Deloitte representatives walked them through the intricacies and concepts of the much-ballyhooed clearinghouse, the industry’s new, somewhat controversial method to prohibit booster payments to athletes.

While the presentation garnered rave reviews, uncertainty and doubt still lingers from coaches and others on the clearinghouse’s legal sustainability and enforcement method.

There’s so much uncertainty, says Georgia coach Kirby Smart, that some schools are promising high school recruits and transferring players third-party NIL deals as part of their compensation package despite an important fact: None of those deals can be approved by a clearinghouse that hasn’t fully launched.

But more concerning, says Smart, is that some school-affiliated, booster collectives are currently compensating high school players — upwards of $20,000 a month — to remain committed and eventually sign with their school.

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“Teams that are unusually good at recruiting right now are doing it. Kids are getting money, but if you decommit, you owe that money back,” Smart said. “These are high school kids getting money from an entity not affiliated with the university but is a collective of the university.”

Pressed to identify the schools, Smart said none of them are in the SEC, but the schools “are signing kids (to contracts) right now and paying upfront through an outside collective.”

It is the latest maneuver from athletic departments to take advantage of this murky, unregulated space as college sports transitions the way in which it compensates athletes — from booster-backed collectives to direct school revenue sharing, a move scheduled to be finalized July 1 if the House settlement is approved.

In the meantime, it is a free-for-all. But not for long, says Kelly.

Three days after the settlement is approved — if it is approved — the “NIL Go” clearinghouse is expected to begin processing athlete NIL contracts. Athletes must submit to the clearinghouse all deals valued at more than $600. Deloitte is using a fair market value algorithm to create a “compensation range” for NIL deals to assure they are not the fabricated contracts that boosters have struck with athletes now for years.

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Smart expects a “mass run” on submissions to the clearinghouse from schools attempting to test the entity to determine just “how much can I get outside the cap,” he said.

“Every team is going to put pressure on Deloitte to say, ‘I need to know! I’m promising this money outside of the cap!’” Smart told Yahoo Sports.

It could get tricky.

The officials from the Deloitte-run clearinghouse “NIL Go” — the centerpiece of the new enforcement entity, dubbed the “College Sports Commission” — is sharing data with coaches and athletic directors, including that 70% of past deals from booster collectives would have been denied. Deloitte also shared that about 80% of NIL deals with public companies were valued at less than $10,000 and 99% of those deals were valued at less than $100,000 — figures that suggest the clearinghouse threatens to significantly curtail the millions of dollars that collectives are distributing to athletes.

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“If you got some mucky deals going on right now, you’d better be careful,” warned Kelly. “These deals have got to be for a valid business purpose. A lot of (previous) deals would have never gotten through.”

Even some of those currently being promised to recruits are at risk of rejection by the clearinghouse, coaches and administrators tell Yahoo Sports. For example, schools are guaranteeing to recruits that a portion of their compensation will be derived from third-party deals. An example of this might be a school guaranteeing a player an entire compensation package of $500,000: $300,000 from the school in revenue share plus $200,000 more in third-party endorsement deals that would, presumably, not count against a school’s revenue-share cap.

What if these third-party deals don’t get approved?

“That’s a risk,” Smart told Yahoo Sports. “Schools are going to either default on a contract, or have lied, or have been right and they gain a player for it.”

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Such a contract is actually prohibited by new rules. Administrators learned of that during a call with House implementation committee members earlier this spring. No third-party NIL deals — including those from multi-media rights companies, apparel brands and corporate sponsors — can be guaranteed to athletes as part of their revenue-sharing contracts from schools.

However, uncertainty still lingers about all of this.

Many legal experts believe that the clearinghouse concept will trigger a bevy of legal challenges, but Texas A&M athletic director Trev Alberts believes in the new entity. He is one of 10 administrators from the Big Ten, Big 12, ACC, SEC and Pac-12 on the implementation committee.

“The reality is not a lot of people understand it or know about it, which leaves them to (say), ‘It won’t work!’ ‘It won’t be fair!’ ‘They don’t know what they’re doing!’” Alberts said from meetings on Tuesday. “The system has to be given a chance.”

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For now, the system cannot formally launch until a decision from a California judge over the House settlement. A decision to approve or deny the settlement has, for nearly two weeks, been in the hands of Judge Claudia Wilken. She’s on her own timeline.

Meanwhile, Alberts acknowledges the jockeying from schools in an attempt to exceed the cap with third-party contracts.

“Everybody is trying to figure out fair market value NIL,” he said. “At the end of the day, we’re all looking for a competitive advantage. What is real is you have rev-share amount and scholarship amount, but what is undefined is how much fair market value deals can you get through NIL Go.

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“The institutions most successful in getting that done, if you can organically grow your cap by $3-5 million per institution, you have more resources as others.”

An affiliation agreement being circulated throughout the power conferences requires schools to abide by the new enforcement rules, even if their state law contradicts them, and waives their right to sue over enforcement decisions. The agreement aims to, above all, protect the clearinghouse’s decisions, exempting it from lawsuits from schools and preventing those schools from circumventing the settlement’s compensation cap through affiliated entities such as collectives.

Alberts calls the agreement “critically important.”

“We are all defendant schools and conferences and you inherently agree to this,” he said. “I sat in the room with all of our football coaches, ‘Do you want to be governed?’ The answer is yes.”

MSU Hockey has stayed newsworthy recently with some exciting happenings. This past Sunday saw the USA win the Ice Hockey World Championships in Stockholm Sweden. The U.S. beat Switzerland 1-0 in overtime. This was the first outright title since 1933. The excitement of that victory reached all the way to East Lansing as Adam Nightingale served as an assistant coach and Isaac Howard was on the roster, meaning two golds are coming back to E.L. Howard did manage an assist in the four games played. It just fuels the excitement for when the Spartans get back on the ice.

Speaking of Howard, there have been some NHL rumors of Tampa potentially trading him at the draft. It seems like Howard wants ice time and to be an integral part of an up and coming team. Many Tampa beat writers do not see him playing in there. I’d keep a lookout on the Chicago Blackhawks. They have draft capital to make the trade, they have the up and coming roster, new coach and even a former Spartan teammate. It will be interesting to see where Howard ends up professionally. Howard is also the recent recipient of USA Hockey’s Jim Johannson College Player of the Year Award. Luckily for us Spartan faithful, we get another year at Munn.

In some other hockey news, Nightingale has brought on a couple of recent signees which means the roster is almost full for next season. Eric Nilson, son of former NHL player Marcus Nilson and a silver medalist for team Sweden in the U18 World Championships. Nilson arrives for the 25/26 season and will also be draft eligible. He is currently ranked number 7 for European Skaters that are draft eligible. He is currently projected as a high second rounder. He is a center which means there is likely one spot left which is theoretically reserved for Cayden Lindstrom. Lindstrom’s Medicine Hat Tigers just clinched their spot in the Memorial Cup Final which will be played on June 1. Once that season has concluded we will await the announcement of Lindstrom to see if he will officially be in East Lansing.

With MSU losing defensemen Tyson Jugnauth, who decided to sign a pro contract, the Spartans were in need of a defensemen to fill that roster spot. Well, they are bringing in a veteran presence with a familiar last name and someone I suspected earlier on would end up a Spartan. That’s right, twin brother of Tiernan Shoudy, Travis will join his brother in East Lansing. Shoudy entered the portal after Ferris State’s season and was expected to head to Colorado College. The open roster spot proved to be too good to pass up. Shoudy should be able to contribute right away and it is always nice having a lefty defender.

With Shoudy signed, the defensive side is filled and Lindstrom will likely be the final piece to the puzzle. It will be exciting to see how the fresh faces gel with the veterans but rest assured, Coach Nightingale will have this team ready, with one goal in mind.

“This generous gift—the largest in the College’s history—will transform Stonehill by enabling us to expand our campus, foster community spirit and support our Division I athletic teams with state-of-the-art training and competition spaces. Over the years, Tom has been a thoughtful and loyal alumnus. He and Kathleen continually demonstrate their philanthropic spirit through the many ways they support Stonehill’s mission, as well as its bright future,” said Rev. John Denning, C.S.C., president of Stonehill College.
 

Longtime donors, the Bogans, who established the Tom ’72 and Kathleen Bogan Endowed Scholarship in 2023, have previously supported the Stonehill College Fund, Stonehill Athletics, and the Leo J. Meehan School of Business. In 2021, Thomas and Kathleen Bogan Hall, which primarily houses Stonehill seniors, was named in the couple’s honor. In 2019, Tom, who also serves as a Stonehill Trustee, received the College’s Outstanding Alumnus Award, which recognized his many contributions to the software industry and to Stonehill. 

“The arena will provide the College with the necessary resources to enhance the student experience and deepen Stonehill’s relationship with neighboring communities that will have access to the facility. Supporting Stonehill’s mission of educating hearts and minds via this new addition to the campus landscape is truly exciting,” said Tom and Kathleen Bogan in a joint statement.

Tom has been an executive and investor in the software industry for most of his career. An accounting major at Stonehill, he was CEO, executive and Board of Directors member at many high-growth software companies, including Citrix Systems, Rational Software, Apptio, AspenTech, Avatar Technologies, PTC and Rally Software. Most recently, he was CEO at Adaptive Insights, which was acquired by Workday in 2018. He then served as Vice Chairman at Workday until January 2022. He is currently on the Board of Directors of public companies Workday (WDAY), CS Disco (LAW) and Catapult Sports (CAT.AU), as well as private companies Reltio and Extensiv.

SPRINGFIELD, Mass. – The Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame announced on Wednesday (May 28) that the UConn men’s and women’s basketball teams will headline a split doubleheader in the Hall of Fame Exhibition Game. The Huskies will both take on Boston College in a pair of preseason contests at Mohegan Sun Arena on Monday, Oct. 13 (Columbus Day/Indigenous Peoples’ Day).

Men’s and women’s basketball season ticket holders will have a priority presale opportunity at a date to be announced. Regular ticket on-sale, tip times and broadcast information will be announced at a later date.

The UConn men played in the inaugural Hall of Fame exhibition at Mohegan Sun a year ago, taking down Rhode Island 102-75. The women’s squad is no stranger to Mohegan and has played a near-annual regular season game at the venue in addition to winning the last five BIG EAST Tournaments all held in Uncasville.

While the exhibitions will not count towards the respective all-time series, Connecticut and Boston College have a long history dating back to 1918 on the men’s side and 1981 on the women’s. The women have compiled a dominant 34-9 record against the Eagles while the men are 55-35.

Both UConn teams are expected to enter the 2025-26 season near the top of the national polls. The 12-time and defending national champion women’s team returns a slew of talent including Final Four MOP Azzi Fudd and National Freshman of the Year Sarah Strong and brings in a top class. The six-time champion men ride a five-year NCAA Tournament streak into the season a year removed from back-to-back titles and return All-Conference performers Alex Karaban and Solo Ball along with a top class of their own.

Additional schedule information for each program will be announced over the course of the offseason.