Ohio State head coach Ryan Day looks on before the College Football Playoff national championship game against Notre Dame, Jan. 20 in Atlanta.

AP Photo | Jacob Kupferman

LAS VEGAS — Next week, college football coaches can put the recruiting promises they have made to high school seniors on paper.

Then the question becomes whether they can keep them.

Uncertainty over a key element of the $2.8 billion NCAA antitrust settlement that is reshaping college sports has placed recruiters on a tightrope.

They need clarity about whether the third-party collectives that were closely affiliated with their schools and that ruled name, image, likeness payments over the first four years of the NIL era can be used to exceed the $20.5 million annual cap on what each school can now pay players directly. Or, whether those collectives will simply become a cog in the new system.

Only until that issue is resolved will many coaches know if the offers they’ve made, and that can become official on Aug. 1, will conform to the new rules governing college sports.

“You don’t want to put agreements on the table about things that we might have to claw back,” Ohio State coach Ryan Day explained at this week’s Big Ten media days. “Because that’s not a great look.”

No coach, of course, is going to fess up to making an offer he can’t back up.

“All we can do is be open and honest about what we do know, and be great communicators from that standpoint,” Oregon’s Dan Lanning said.

Aug. 1 is key because it marks the day football programs can start sending written offers for scholarships to high school prospects starting their senior year.

This process essentially replaces what used to be the signing of a national letter of intent. It symbolizes the changes taking hold in a new era in which players aren’t just signing for a scholarship, but for a paycheck, too.

Paying them is not a straightforward business. Among the gray areas comes from guidance issued earlier this month by the newly formed College Sports Commission, in charge of enforcing rules involved with paying players, both through the $20.5 million revenue share with schools and through third-party collectives.

The CSC is in charge of clearing all third-party deals worth $600 or more.

It created uncertainty earlier this month when it announced, in essence, that the collectives did not have a “valid business purpose.” if their only reason to exist was ultimately to pay players. Lawyers for the players barked back and said that is what a collective was always met to be, and if it sells a product for a profit, it qualifies as legit.

The parties are working on a compromise, but if they don’t reach one they will take this in front of a judge to decide.

With Aug. 1 coming up fast, coaches are eager to lock in commitments they’ve spent months, sometimes years, locking down from high school recruits.

“Recruiting never shuts off, so we do need clarity as soon as we can,” Buckeyes athletic director Ross Bjork said. “The sooner we can have clarity, the better. I think the term ‘collective’ has obviously taken on a life of its own. But it’s really not what it’s called, it’s what they do.”

In anticipating the future, some schools have disbanded their collectives while others, such as Ohio State, have brought them in-house. It is all a bit of a gamble. If the agreement that comes out of these negotiations doesn’t restrict collectives, they could be viewed as an easy way to get around the salary cap. Either way, schools are eyeing ways for players to earn money outside the cap amid reports that big programs have football rosters worth more than $30 million in terms of overall player payments.

“It’s a lot to catch up, and there’s a lot for coaches and administrators to deal with,” Big Ten Commissioner Tony Petitti said, noting the terms only went into play on July 1. “But I don’t think it’s unusual when you have something this different that there’s going to be some bumps in the road to get to the right place. I think everybody is committed to get there.”

Indiana coach Curt Cignetti, whose program tapped into the transfer portal and NIL to make the most remarkable turnaround in college football last season, acknowledged “the landscape is still changing, changing as we speak today.”

“You’ve got to be light on your feet and nimble,” he said. “At some point, hopefully down the road, this thing will settle down and we’ll have clear rules and regulations on how we operate.”

At stake at Oregon is what is widely regarded as a top-10 recruiting class for a team that finished first in the Big Ten and made the College Football Playoff last year, along with three other teams from the league.

“It’s an interpretation that has to be figured out, and anytime there’s a new rule, it’s how does that rule adjust, how does it adapt, how does it change what we have to do here,” Lanning said. “But one thing we’ve been able to do here is — what we say we’ll do, we do.”

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Ross Hodge spent more than 40 minutes Thursday afternoon inside the Basketball Practice Facility answering questions about the Mountaineer men’s basketball program.

Last March, Hodge left North Texas to become WVU’s fourth head coach in a span of four years, meaning this will be the fourth complete roster overhaul since West Virginia lost 67-65 to Maryland in the opening round of the NCAA Tournament on March 16, 2023.

In that span of time, a staggering 47 different players have been issued Mountaineer uniform numbers.

The guys returning from one year to the next can be counted on two hands, including redshirt freshman center Abraham Oyeadier this year.

Guard Kedrian Johnson, in 2023, was probably the last established returning player that West Virginia basketball fans could easily recognize.

In many respects, major college basketball today has turned into what junior college basketball has been for years when JC players and coaches were getting a bad rap. For decades, the knock on junior college coaches was they couldn’t develop four-year players, and the guys they were recruiting were in junior college for a reason, and usually not a good one.

Well, things have changed dramatically over the last couple of years and the coaches with junior college experience in their backgrounds like Ross Hodge are actually becoming pretty appealing today.

In junior college, coaches must be resourceful and efficient because their rosters basically turn over each year. Now that we’re in the transfer portal era of college basketball, the same thing is happening at the major college level.

“I think there was a time when there was a negative stereotype associated with junior college coaches,” he said. “I’ve mentioned this before, I got my first head coaching job when I was 25 and coached against some legendary, hall of fame coaches that to the common person, those names don’t mean much, but they mean everything to me.

“They easily could be sitting in my chair right now, and it’s like, ‘Well, they only have guys for a year or two and can they take four-year guys and develop them?’ Now, it’s obviously flipped to where you are going to have high roster turnover, and you are going to be merging a group of guys together and how quickly can you get them to come together playing for one purpose and one reason?”

Hodge experienced high roster turnover during his two years as North Texas’ head coach because in the pecking order of things, his better players were going to get cherry-picked by the power conference programs anyway. He took a team last year with three returning players and led them to a 27-9 record and the NIT semifinals.

“It’s kind of a new norm that we’ve all had to deal with,” he explained. “If you can bring back three or four players now, you feel like you’ve brought back dang near your whole roster.”

Consequently, coaches must have a good plan in place when dealing with frequent roster turnover, and the philosophy Hodge uses today was perfected more than a decade ago when he was coaching one of the top junior college programs in the country in Midland, Texas.

During his two seasons there before joining Larry Eustachy’s Southern Mississippi staff, he turned Midland into a JC power with players such as Guy Landry Edi (Gonzaga), Jonathon Simmons (Houston) and Ty Nurse (Texas Tech).

High on the list of qualities Hodge seeks in the players he recruits is having experience playing for winning teams. A quick scan of the 12-player roster Hodge and his Mountaineer staff has assembled so far is pretty revealing.

Guard Honor Huff was on the NIT championship team at Chattanooga last year, while center Harlan Obioha (UNC Wilmington) and forward Jackson Fields (Troy) played in the NCAA Tournament.

Two years ago, guard Morris Ugusuk played in the NCAA Tournament during his freshman season at South Carolina.

Guard Chance Moore has played on teams that have won at least 20 games each year he’s played college basketball, including a 22-win year at St. Bonaventure last season.

Guard Jasper Floyd and forward Brenen Lorient were key members of Hodge’s North Texas team that reached the NIT semifinals.

Freshman forward D.J. Thomas and touted top-100 guard prospect Amir Jenkins are coming to Morgantown from highly successful prep programs.

“These guys have experience winning, and they kind of understand that part of it and what winning takes,” Hodge explained. “Then, you try to get them to understand, ‘Okay, how are we going to win together?’ You don’t have to teach them how to win, necessarily.

“Some of it is you do the best you can assembling it and then when you get them all together you kind of figure out what the team’s strengths and weaknesses are, address it and build it from there,” he added.

The recent signing of Jenkins, a four-star guard prospect from Worcester, Massachusetts, demonstrates Hodge’s recruiting chops. Earlier this month, ESPN college basketball expert Fran Fraschilla posted on X that West Virginia “hit the jackpot” with the signing of Jenkins, calling it “Christmas in July” for Mountaineer fans.

Jenkins, a high school junior, reclassified to this year and will be a member of the Mountaineer program this fall.

“We feel really fortunate for that,” Hodge admitted. “It is a situation where he originally planned on doing another prep year, but a lot of those guys now have so many credits that they can graduate as juniors if they want to. 

“It was more a matter of him becoming comfortable with the opportunity we had for him,” he said. “We just went really hard and really aggressive with him, and we’re excited to add him. He’s a guy who makes others better around him, so we feel real fortunate to be able to add him when we added him.”

In Huff and North Dakota small forward Treysen Eaglestaff, the Mountaineers are adding proven scorers. Last year, the 6-foot-6 Eaglestaff scored a Summit League Tournament record 51 points in North Dakota’s victory over South Dakota State, and he finished the season averaging 18.9 points per game.

Huff, an explosive New York City point guard, paced Chattanooga with an average of 15.2 points per game while leading the country with 131 3-point field goals.

Hodge took a calculated risk signing Moore, who was recently granted a fifth year by the NCAA. He averaged 13 points and 6.5 rebounds per game last year for the Bonnies after also spending time at Missouri State and Arkansas.

Obioha is a legitimate 7-footer with the ability to score near the basket. In UNC Wilmington’s opening round NCAA Tournament loss to Texas Tech, Obioha tallied seven points and grabbed nine rebounds against a Red Raider team that reached the Elite Eight.

The center had 17 double-figure scoring games and five double-digit rebounding efforts last season.

Ugusuk played in 32 games last year for the Gamecocks, starting six, and averaging 5.9 points and 1.4 rebounds per game. He scored a career-high 20 points against Vanderbilt.

Floyd and Lorient combined to average more than 20 points per game at North Texas, and Lorient was recognized as an all-conference and Sixth Man of the Year performer.

Freshman guard Jayden Forsythe, originally from Brooklyn, was considered one of the top five players in the Keystone State this year while playing at Westtown School in West Chester, Pennsylvania, in suburban Philadelphia.

It is an interesting and intriguing roster that Hodge has assembled so far, and he’s got one more spot remaining. He said on Thursday that he plans on filling it.

“We’re working on that daily,” he said. “At this point in time, it’s best available more than anything. Commonly, basketball fans look at rosters and they always want you to add another big guy, which I get, but I usually have to remind people there is really only one big guy out on the floor at a time, and there are usually three little guys around him, but we have pretty good roster balance right now.

“We’re trying to add the right person, as much as anything,” he added.

The right person from a winning program, of course.

 

So we’re gonna try. Usually, at, at the request of those in attendance, we mix football specific questions with more personal stuff, right? Just so you get to know these guys a little better. This is different than a press conference, right? I was with Coach Diaz, Coach Doran, and Coach Belichick at the ACC. a kickoff event yesterday, it’s, it’s a zoo. I mean, it was like the Beatles combined with Taylor Swift following Coach Belichick around at that event yesterday. Like it was crazy. And all three of them were a lot of fun in front of the microphones. Let’s start with a really broad question and a more personal one. And coach, uh Doran, we’ll start with you and work, work our way back. Y’all will get the same question, just, just to start. Take us back to your childhood. Remind us where were you living? Were you watching favorite football teams on TV? Were you playing football in the backyard? And just tell us how that those early times led you to first fall in love with football. Yeah, uh, grew up in Kansas City and so was a perennial Kansas City Chiefs fan at that time we were not what we are today, um, pretty bad at that time. So there was a linebacker though that’s actually, uh, an apt state grab, Dino Hackett, who had the biggest neck roll in the world. And at that time, that was pretty cool. So all of us that played football were running around with extra pads and big neck rolls trying to be like Dino Hackett from the Kansas City Chiefs and uh. Yeah, I mean, that was basically it. Cool. Coach Diaz. I grew up in Miami, Florida, and, but I was raised in the Orange Bowl. So as a, as a kid, the 80s in Miami was, was a well in football wise, it was, it was a great time. The, the Dolphins went to the Super Bowl twice in ’82 and ’84. As an 11 year old, I was watching the most watched Monday Night football game in person when the undefeated Bears came down in the Orange Bowl and lost to Dan Marino and the Dolphins, and then the Miami Hurricanes won it in ’83, 87, 89, 91, which was the year I graduated high school. So it was a good time to be a kid growing up in uh Miami for football. Coach Belichick. Yeah, after 3 years in Chapel Hill, uh, my dad went to the Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, uh, followed, uh, my dad around, uh, with those teams, especially the, uh, Belino Staubach, uh, teams and, and, um, you know, this was all that hung around Navy football and, um. Not a good player, so I turned my attention to coaching. Coach, Coach Oliver, go ahead. Uh, growing up, my father was a high school football coach, and I loved to be around and, and I was a ball boy. So every time they kicked extra points, I had to go behind the stadium and shag the balls. Um, I’m from the, the tidewater, so Hampton was playing Bethel in high school and out in the projects and. I’m out there by myself, shagging balls and all these little kids out there trying to get the ball. So for me to do that and put my life on the line, I’d obviously love football. Hey, for those who don’t know, Tidewater and South Florida are two of the most famous high school football parts of our entire country. Coach Baker. Yeah, was, uh, was born and raised in West Texas and so being from Texas, um, football is a way of life down there and it’s true. So, um, where I’m from, Friday Night Lights, that, that’s real. And so for us growing up, you know, wanting to play for your high school football team was like playing for the Dallas Cowboys and then As a kid for me it’s changed kind of opposite because Dorn, you know, when I was a kid, the Dallas Cowboys were winning Super Bowls and we’re a long way from that now. But that, uh, growing up in West Texas and, and watching Troy Aikman and Emitt Smith and those guys growing up is, is how it started. We’re gonna take this next question to you, Coach Baker, and then work our way in the opposite direction. Uh, you all know the NCAA has been around for more than 100 years, right? This month, July 2025, is the first time that we have something called revenue sharing. So a maximum of $20.5 million can go directly from a school’s athletic department. To the players, athletes in multiple sports, and it’s up to each school to decide how much of that 20.5 million to distribute among their players and then who gets it, right? So with that in mind, we’ll work again, starting with Coach Baker. How does this new NCAA structure affect your school or even your job as a football coach? Yeah, I think you’ll, you’ll probably hear the same thing from his coach. It, it still raises a lot of questions. Um, that we got to find answers to. But for us at East Carolina, you know, it’ll, it’ll affect us differently than other people at the table. But for us, it sets us up, you know, our administration, you know, our board of trustees has set us up to compete at a high level in the American Conference. And for us, You know, to be able to do that, to be able to support our student athletes, um, with it, I think it’s a great thing. Now, obviously, like anything that’s happened over the last 4 or 5 years in college athletics, you know, we’ve got, we gotta find the parameters to it. We’ve got to find the ways to regulate it. But as far as being able to, you know, have the intentions to help our student athletes, to me, it set us up and, you know, like I said, our university has put us in a great spot to compete at a high level. Coach Oliver, you always look at me funny when I ask these questions because I, I know you’re living in a slightly different world than some of the others next to you. Oh, I’m just quoting you. Well, obviously not every conference is getting uh $20 each school is getting $20 million or whatever you’re talking about. So that’s. I don’t know. Uh, I think it’s a place for it. Uh, obviously, we’re in a little different tax bracket, but, um, uh, I think it’s, I think he’s laughing a little hard over here. Well, no, I, I think it’s a place for us where we can help our young men, uh, get home during, you know, um, um, holidays and things of that nature and help with their nutritional needs, um, but, but as far as the, the Bentleys and the Maseratis and all that other stuff, you see he’s got parking lots, man, it’s crazy. We haven’t gotten there yet. Coach Belichick. Uh, yeah, it’s, uh, it’s similar to the NFL model, um, but with way, way less money. Um, you’re looking at maybe $300 million for 50 some players in the NFL compared to say 15 to $20 million for 100 players in college football. So the money’s quite different, but the model is similar. Coach Diaz. Yeah, I think it’s different, right? We’ve had so much change in our sport, but I think it reinforces the things that never change. You still need to be a relationship-based organization. You want your recruiting to be relationship based. You know, we’re fortunate at Duke, the parents who drop their kids off at Duke University, want their kids to graduate from Duke. And so now really the name of the game is retention. You know, used to be about acquisition and development, but now you’ve got to retain them. You got to keep them. Because they could be free agents basically right now twice a year we’re hoping to get that done once a year. So we say in our building retention is a daily chore. You got to be the same people every day to make the relationships last for to keep them, which is no different than any of you do in your business, your line of work, to keep your employees happy. Coach Dorn, yeah, you know, it’s uh probably in the last 3 or 4 years I’ve been doing this 31 years in college now, seen more change than I did in the previous 28 of my career and when the NIL first started, it was a it was a mess and so I think we’re all happy that the revenue of shares now on campus. Um, we were out fundraising. I know Manny and I when NIL started. Like it was 50% of our job. I mean it was crazy and so to now know that there’s guaranteed rev share dollars that we don’t have to go out and do that with and, and I felt sorry for the donors. A lot of them are in here. I mean it was donor fatigue for many of you and uh thank you know everyone in here that’s done that because it’s important. Uh it’s been great to see what some of our student athletes have been able to do for their families and, uh, I mean life changing for some of them who’s. You know rent was up and they couldn’t pay their rent and things like that and getting their families to come to games. It’s been really good and so you know for the ADs that we work for, the chancellors, presidents that we work for to know that that revenue now is coming in through guaranteed streams, I think has been a very positive thing. I would say you know we all deal with the negative sides of it and hopefully they’ll be able to get their arms around. You know, making this thing what it’s supposed to be. The NCA was created to create a level playing field for college sports, and it’s been the opposite the last 4 years. You know, it’s been who can pay the most to create a football team, you know, as you saw with last year’s national champion supposedly was paying over $20 million for their roster. And so we need to get back to our coaching and, and development and relationships is still the major focus behind what we do, and not just how, how much we can, you know, come up with to get somebody on our team. These guys have very different backgrounds. Coach Diaz’s dad was the mayor of the city of Miami. Coach Belichick’s dad, of course, that longtime coach at the Naval Academy. My next question, let’s start back at this end again, Coach Baker. Uh, remind us when you knew your playing days were over and what combination of people or inspirations, mentors, uh, or just details made you initially know that coaching football was going to be a part of your future. Yeah, my, uh, my mom was a school teacher growing up. Dad’s a, a family business owner and farmer, uh, there in Texas and so, but my dad was always our, our little league coach growing up and so I just remember growing up. All my friends to this day, probably they still call my dad coach and he’s never been a high school coach or a college coach and so I knew early on that I wanted to, um, then when I finished playing at Abilene Christian in 2013, um, just the impact that my college coaches, Chris Thompson and Ken Collins had on me, um, it was, it was something I knew I wanted to get into. I thought forever I’d always be a Texas high school football coach. They convinced me to be a grad assistant and you know, 11 years later, here we sit. Go ahead, Coach Oliver. Yeah, right before I, um, after I graduated, right before our, our pro day, I got hurt and I didn’t want to be that 30 year old guy, still trying to make it to the NFL. And, um, lucky I got a, a call from my former coach and asked me to come up to Delaware State uh to be their defensive back coach. I was 22 years old, um, full-time defensive back coach, and I thought I was rich making $27,000. Coach Belichick. Uh, yeah, I tried to get into college football, uh, after college, applied to 125 different schools for a graduate assistant position, uh, but, uh, wasn’t able to, to make that work out. Uh, so I went to work for the Baltimore Colts, um, $25 a week. That’s probably about all I was worth. And, uh, then that’s worked out OK. Uh. I don’t want to cut you off, coach. Coach Diaz, assuming Coach Belichick was done. I’m not sure. That’s it. Yeah, I was pretty self aware growing up, even in high school while I was playing, I kind of knew that that was going to come to an end, so I pivoted. I, I, I said, what’s the next best thing to play? I didn’t know how you became a coach, so I decided that media would be it. So went to college sports editor of the paper had a TV show, the whole deal. I go work at ESPN. That’s what I’m gonna do. I’m gonna have your job, David, and, and uh you’re good at it I never told you this, but January of ’97 we’re in New Orleans Super Bowl. Brett Favre and the Green Bay Packers are playing the upstart New England Patriots coached by a Bill, another Bill Parcells, and um I went into an interview with him. I I had no duties. I was just sitting in the back of the room and watching that guy talk for 45 minutes. I said, I said I need to do that. And uh Been doing that ever since. Coach Dorn. Uh, yeah, I was, uh, on the pre-med track in college. I thought I was gonna be an orthopedic surgeon and, and, uh, my My dream team, the Kansas City Chiefs doctor, uh, ended up doing knee surgery on me right before my senior season, and I asked him if I could shadow him through the process, uh, kind of like an internship. And so for 2 weeks prior to the surgery and, and 2 weeks after, uh, this is how dumb I am. I got an epidural so I could stay awake and watch my own knee surgery. So I actually did that and uh. I had both my knees done the same day, OK? I had meniscus surgery on both knees. I watched the whole thing and I thought that was pretty damn cool and. So I’m a little sick that way, I guess, but. You know, when it ended, uh, John Brown, who’s the team doc for the Chiefs, followed him around. He’s gracious to me and he was running from meeting to meeting. He had a 3 hour wait to get in and see him. He couldn’t spend time with his patients, and so I met with them and they said, Doc, I love football. I love helping people and I’m pretty good at science, and this is what I wanted to do, but it doesn’t seem like you have any relationships with your, your patients anymore, and he said, I can’t. And so I left there pretty dishearten, uh, went home, met with my high school counselor who was a mentor of mine, and he said just take a gap year. You don’t have to go to med school right away. Come home, we’ll pay you a couple bucks to help coach the football team and so I did that and fell in love with coaching and was very fortunate after a year of high school coaching, my college coach hired me to be a GA and uh at that time. It’s pretty cool. It was me, uh, as GA Chris Ash, who’s the the coordinator for Notre Dame, was the other GA on defense. uh, Brendan Daly, who coached, uh, for coach Blchick, who’s a linebacker coach for the Chiefs now. Charlie Partridge, who’s the D-line coach for the Colts. We were the four GAs at Drake, and we all played together and so my head coach got all 4 of us into the profession. And it’s turned out really well and I will say sidebar, my mom wanted to beat the living, you know what out of me when I told her I’m not going to med school, I’m gonna be a high school football coach. She’s wised up now, but you know it’s a tough week at the house. Coach, we’re gonna start this next one with you and work our way back down toward me. Uh, one of the funny things about this event is there are many years where I ask you all for questions, and one of the football questions is always about the quarterbacks. And when we talk to these guys, sometimes they say we spent too much time on quarterbacks. So since y’all are the ones who paid dollars to be here, I’m asking a quarterback question. Uh, and these guys are used to it. They’ve been at media days. But, um, coach, your quarterback room, uh, you’re one of those who has a guy who started some last year, uh, same with Coach Baker, and some variety. In between some transport transfer portal guys are going to be starting at some schools. Uh, give us a little more detail about your projected starter and then just maybe a sentence about a backup or two. Yeah, it’s nice to have a returning starter. I’ll say that to lead off. It’s been 3 years. I was fortunate, uh, early on had Jacoby Brissette for 3 years and then Ryan Fendley for 3 years. Devin Leary for multiple years and then I’ve been in the transfer portal world here for 3 years and so CJ Bailey returns as our starting quarterback. CJ was thrust in so being a starter as a true freshman, uh, mid-year last year and has grown a lot. Uh, he looks great. He’s put on 30 pounds since we got him on campus 18 months ago, and he’s, you know, one of the best. You know, uh, just emotional and spiritual type guys when he walks in the room, you just smile, you know, he’s got great enthusiasm for football, for his teammates, for leadership. And so going into an offseason with the returning starter, the head coach is a nice feeling. Especially when you like who that returning starter is, um, and behind him, you know, we love the guys that we have Lex Thomas, who’s the 3rd Thomasson, um, that we’ve had now with Drake Thomas, who’s with the Seahawks and Thayer who’s with the Vikings. Lex is our backup and, and then we signed a, a young man last year that came in early, Will Wilson, that we’re really excited about as well. to win 9 games, we set a school record for touchdown passes. We felt we were successful. We didn’t think we were excellent, so we had our eye on the portal to see if we can improve ourselves and Mensa. Who has a first year starter as a red shirt freshman at Tulane last year, threw for about 2800 yards. Um, but beyond that, the two things that really stood out, one on the field, he just added a different element, his ability to manipulate pass rush with his feet, keep his eyes down the field, scramble the run, scramble the throw, make you have to defend two plays on defense, which is defensive guys we know what a stress that is. Um, but there’s a very distinct culture in the Duke locker room. Our university attracts a specific type of young man. And we felt like Dari and getting to know him and it’s speed dating in the portal now, but getting to know Darian, he was an outstanding fit for our guys and our culture, and he wanted to stay at a high academic school. Thankfully he chose us and since he’s been on our campus, he has proven not just from the football standpoint to be what we thought he was, but again our players love him. As everybody knows that if the team will fight for the quarterback, then you got a chance and so we think we’ve got a chance with him behind him we have Henry Beile and we’re very fortunate. He started in the bowl game through a couple of touchdown passes against Ole Miss, has started some games in the past, and then Dan Mayhan, who he signed. We think she’s got a really bright future. came in as a mid-year this spring and performed very well for just getting dropped off from the school bus. Quick reminder to everybody, right now, at least the rules allow two transfer portal windows. So Darien Mensa of Tulane arrived prior to spring practice at Duke, uh, whereas at Go Lopez at Carolina, as we turned to Coach Belichick, arrived in the late window, which means he was not there for spring practice, uh, and that adds a different dynamic. Coach Belichick. Uh, yeah, this will be short. Um, Geo, uh, Geo wasn’t there for spring practice. Uh, Max, uh, missed spring practice, um, still recovering from his leg injury. Uh, and then we have two freshmen who, of course, haven’t played. So, uh, we’ll see how it goes. Coach, you brought Geo Lopez to media day yesterday. You can’t give us a little more about him? Like, what, what, what attracted you to him? Come on, man. Yeah, no, he did it, yeah, Geo, you know, had a great year at uh USA and, um, and obviously we’re excited to have him. He just doesn’t play for us. Coach Oliver. I started as uh Walker Harris right here, uh, Heritage High School, um, phenomenal young man. He sat behind um a two-time player of the Year, uh, Davis Richard, and nowadays you don’t very rarely see that guys being patient and wanting to grow and learn. Uh, so he’s gonna start again this year and then behind him, uh, we have Joshua Jones out of Westtover High School in Fayetville, and then JVon Martin out of Sumter, South Carolina. And our 2 and 3, both of those guys got significant amount of reps last year, and then we had opportunities to reassured them. Coach Baker, kind of like Coach Doran, you had a quarterback midseason change, but you have him back. Yeah, really excited about Kate Hauser. Um, he came in last year from Michigan State, originally from. St. John Bosco in California. This time last year was in a quarterback competition, did not win the job, and his resiliency, his ability to just be a great teammate, the 1st 5 or 6 games as the backup took over for us midway through the season. He’s a big reason why we had the success we had late in the year. A 5 on 1 record, uh, threw for over 2000 yards, almost 20 touchdowns in those six games. And so, um, I’m really pleased with him, more so just the jump that he’s made from year one to year two, obviously knowing our system, but also just the leader that he is. He’s, he’s exactly what you want in that position. Tough, um, great leader, great teammate. Um, behind him, um, we had You know, two freshmen and a red shirt sophomore, Raheem Jeter from Spartanburg, South Carolina, um, that had, had a combined 3 college football snaps. And so after the spring window, uh, went and found a, a guy that, uh, I feel like we’re really, really fortunate to get in Mike Wright. He’s a guy that started, started at quarterback in Mississippi State in the SEC and then at Northwestern at Big 10. So he’ll be our, our backup this upcoming season, um, but really talented, more impressive young man that will be a great asset going into the season. There are a lot of successful business people in this room, and I think many of us have a rule of thumb that about, you know, 80 or 90% of the time you just respect the person that you’re negotiating with, but there’s that smaller slice of time where you, you just like, you’ve got to be kidding me, right? That and these guys right now are living in a you’ve got to be kidding me era of college football, even though I know y’all will say that most of your players are reasonable or recruits. I wonder, don’t name names. I’m not looking to get anybody in trouble. But give us an example of a you’ve got to be kidding me story where either a player asks for something that’s outrageous or you see something that that symbolizes the dramatically changed nature of college football even in the last 5 years because of what they’re asking for compared to what their value is. Let’s start at the end with Coach Doran and come back. Man, you gotta get some better questions than that. the goal is to help people have some fun and laugh a little bit. I mean, you know, you could tell us 9 fun stories, but you gotta be kidding me stories are what you guys talk about when the cameras aren’t on, and that’s why these people paid to be here. Yeah, I’m gonna say you gotta be kidding me with that question. But uh Yeah, I’ll just give you an example. So this was last year we had a young man, a good kid, and he was earning, you know, some NIow money and at the end of the year, the biggest problem we face is the agents. The agents call these young men and their families, and they promise them whatever amount of money to leave and go to another school and uh and sometimes it’s hard to get it out of them, you know, and so I knew what he was making. And I said, what are you talking about? And he’s like, well, I got a school that’s gonna pay me 3 times that. And I just said, well, where is it? And he told me, and I said, you need to take it. And because I’m not paying you that I mean you’re a backup for us and, and he made 3 times the amount of money to go to this other school and we play him so we’ll see how it turns out but you know it’s, it’s just crazy some of the numbers that get thrown around and, and you never know for them or for us if some of this information is even real because some of these agents lie to these kids left and right. See, I told you the behind the scenes stuff was interesting. Coach Diaz. Yeah, the way I’ll answer that is, um, you know, I was the head coach for 3 years at Miami, uh, then 2 years, went to Penn State as defense coordinator, and then now coming back. The 24 months I was not head coach, it’s like the job changed, uh, in that time frame. When I was head coach at Miami, there would be kids in South Florida who their lifelong dream was to be a Miami hurricane. They would commit to us. And then a few months later they’d call us in tears and let’s just say for the sake of argument they were offered 25,000 rabbits, right? They’ll say they loved rabbits and someone offered them 25,000 rabbits and at Miami we had no rabbits to offer. We couldn’t offer any rabbits and the kid, he loved Miami, but his family, they really needed and loved those rabbits, right, so stunt did not have rabbits and we’d watch that kid become a first round draft choice at a school and, you know, let’s say the southern part of the country that offered the 25,000 rabbits. Well, when I came back to being a head coach. That same kid was now demanding 2,500 250,000 rabbits. The amount of rabbits went 10, 10X up. It’s a lot of rabbits, right? And that’s why you’ve been hearing all the news about what’s it gonna be like, what’s been going on, which which Dave mentioned, what’s been happening the last four years has not been sustainable because there’s no one in this room whose value suddenly just went up 10x. That’s really what happened. Uh, so we’re hoping for some guidelines. We’re hoping that this house settlement, it doesn’t have to be perfect, but it will be better, um, because ultimately, as Dave said, guess who we’re asking for rabbits, the people in this room, you know what I mean, you only feel like giving so many rabbits until you damn run out of rabbits, you know what I mean? So um. Anyway, there’s no other event of any kind where you’re getting football rabbit answers like that one. Coach Belichick. Um, yeah, well, since I haven’t. Ben in in this arena, uh Dave like you and Manny have um. I don’t really had much comment on that question. Uh, rabbit, so that’s good. But coach, you have, you have, you have a GM. I go, I go to the other end of the spectrum, um. Uh, you know, when I was in New England, uh, there was a, a wrestler that was, um, competing for the Olympics, and, uh, he lost to, uh, Brock Lesnar and so he’s only one heavyweight that could go, um, so he got a call and said, hey, this guy wants to play football. Uh, after his wrestling career, you know, it was ended, uh, you know, his college wrestling career. And, um, I said, well, he played football before? He said, no. Never played football, didn’t play in junior high school, didn’t play in high school, didn’t play in college. They want to try out. Like right. So we bring him in and uh he spent the first year on the practice squad and then he started for us for 7 years, 3 Super Bowls at New England. Steve Neal never played football and started playing football at 24 years old, um, and started for 7 years. It was pretty, pretty incredible story. Um, so when we think about the guys that want all the rabbits, there’s some guys that You know, can start at the bottom and work their way up and, um, you know, just through a lot of hard work, dedication, perseverance, and just out competing the guy ahead of them. Um, there’s a place for that too. So, um, I think that’s still present in, in football, um. And then there’s the other end of the spectrum. Coach Oliver, I know you say you’re in a different tax bracket, but young people, it’s not, it’s not always about money. It could be about playing time, it could be about other variables. What’s your, you gotta be kidding me story? Well, it’s on what these guys do, OK? We’re proud to play Howard University on Friday night. In pre-game and I look up and I see y’all enjoy this one. I see. Virginia Tech staff member on our sidelines. So I’m like, what are you still doing on the sidelines? Oh well, he’s here to go see Bulldog because he and Bulldog had a relationship. And I, first of all, Bulldog’s not that nice of a dude anyway. Sorry, no, that’s, that’s the first lie. But Virginia Tech was actually on my sideline recruiting my running back. Wow. So thank God he didn’t get him. He won the UVA. He got $400,000 though, $400,000. So he’s starting at UVA now and I hope they kick Virginia Tech’s butt. Yeah. See, I told you you’d get good answers to this question. They might not all like it, but it’s, that’s, those are good stories. Go ahead, Coach Baker. Yeah, I think, um, I think hopefully, like we said, the, the house settlement brings some stability, logic, because that to me has been what’s lacking in the last 3 or 4 years. I’ll use a, a story from uh previous university, you know, I was at Ole Miss for 3 years and We had a player team, offensive player is actually in my position room in the tight end room and um the year before he finished with maybe 5 or 6 catches, maybe 80 yards, was a roll guy, um, but he was a developmental guy. I felt really good about. And so then the next. Spring had an unbelievable spring, you know, just, uh, really took a step forward. And then at the end of spring ball, you know, walked in, say, we’ll, we’ll stick with the, the rabbit analogy, say he’s making 30,000 rabbits. Now he wants to make 250,000 rabbits. And so, you know, I just remember sitting in that room and, and Coach Kiffin obviously having an NFL background, like looking at the kid unders trying to get him to understand like what you’re asking for, you haven’t Produce one second in a real actual football game, but yet you think, you know, practicing well earns you a new contract and you know, trying to explain to these guys like if you go into an NFL GM’s office and ask for this, they’ll laugh in your face. And so, like I said, you know, hopefully there’s some logic and, and some stability that comes from it, but that’s, you know, that’s, those are the conversations that, you know, everybody at this table has been having the last 3 or 4 years. We’ve got about one question left before those who bid on helmets successfully get your signed helmet and a quick photo with the coach. So maybe take a minute each to just give us an overview since the games are not crazy far away, and we’ll start at this end, Coach Baker. Um, just how do you, and in your case with Coach Harrell, how do you summarize those key elements that are going to be the difference in your eyes between getting where you want to go or falling short of that? Yeah, so really, really excited. Obviously, Coach Harrell going into his first full year um as a, as a head football coach at East Carolina and just, you know, from the second he took over last year, you could tell the difference in our team, um, just the way they play, the way they carry themselves. And so it’s been awesome for the last 78 months to watch him, you know, really put his fingerprints on our program, um, going into our season, really excited, obviously going into year 2 of our offensive system. To retain some key players like like Caton, like some of our receivers, um, but also, you know, adding some pieces, you know, defensively brought in Josh Aldridge, who comes to us from Auburn as our defense coordinator. Um, so really excited about both sides of the ball. You know, we got a challenging schedule, you know, obviously opening up here in Raleigh versus NC State, go on the road to Coastal Carolina, and then have BYU who will probably be a top 10 team. Uh, coming to Doddie Fickland Stadium in Greenville, um, and then opening conference play, you know, really appreciate the American Conference. They give us BYU on a Saturday and then turn around and play Army, the defending conference champs on a Thursday night. So that will, uh, that’ll be awesome. Glad I’m not a defensive coach that week, um, and then turn around after a bye week and play two lanes. So, uh, you, you pair our non-conference schedule with um. With opening with the two teams that played in our conference championship a year ago, it presents a big task and a challenge for us, but we’re excited. We got a young team, but a talented team, and it’s just like anybody else in the country. How fast can you add your new guys to the mix? How fast can you gel that team and get going in the right direction. So it’s a challenge, but we’re excited for it. Coach Oliver. Can you please repeat the what, how do you summarize just the key elements that, that you believe looking at your team right now will likely make the difference between getting where you wanna go and falling short of that. No questions. Thank you. Our motto is culture over skiing, and it’s about how you walk, how you talk, how you move, um, what type of teammate you are. That’s more important than the scheme where we run inside zone, outside zone, throw 3 step, throw the ball down field. So, um, continuity is a big thing, um. It is a huge thing. Uh, we, you know, we’ve got to be. He played for 60 minutes, and we had a really good season last year, uh, had one bad half and it cost the championship. Last year, a great season, one bad quarter. So, um, consistency and, and it’s all about the culture. Coach Belichick. Uh, well, we have 70 new players on our team, um, from last year’s team, so, uh, a lot of new faces. Um, we’ll see how it all comes together, you know, excited to start the year against TCU on Labor Day. Um, we’ve got a lot of work to do between now and then, and, and, uh, we’ll just have to see how it all comes together, but just one day at a time and just try to be better tomorrow than we were yesterday and, uh, just grind it out and see where we’re at. Quick reminder, the new rules allow for 105 players on a football roster. That’s brand new this year. So if you have 70 new players, as Coach Belichick just said, that’s literally 2/3 of your roster, which is pretty high percentage historically. Coach Diaz, I was told there’d be no Matthew today. I did it for you. I’ve I’ve coached in the Big 10 and the SEC, and, and to me what separates the SEC from those leagues, those leagues are when I was at Penn State, there were 3 teams that were just miles better than everybody else we played against, um, same thing SEC, there’s there’s a sort of a group at the top that sort of dominate our league. The the disparity in talent is so much less. Everybody’s pretty much playing with a very similar roster. All that to say, it comes down to close games, I think. Over half of our games last year were decided by a touchdown or less. So whether you end up at the top of the pack or the bottom of the pack, probably it’s gonna come down to a drive, a couple of drives during the course of the game. If you play 32 quarters in 8 games, 2 or 3 bad quarters might be the difference between whether you’re playing in Charlotte end of the year or or you know, going to Shreveport for a bowl game or not going to a bowl game at all. So, um, you have to win the fine margins. You have to stay healthy, you have to protect the ball, the things that obvious that everybody in here knows, but it’s going to come down to a kick, a 4th down stop, a red zone score, that’s just how this league has won and lost every year. As we give Coach Doran the last word, so to speak, a quick reminder, a couple of these guys have really hard 1 p.m. commitments. So when we wrap up, whoever got those winning helmets, come on up, let’s keep these guys’ day rolling because we want you to get that signed helmet and of course the quick photo. Coach Doran, same question to you as you get the last word. Yeah, excited to get back on the grass with our players, definitely a team and a staff. It has a lot to prove, you know, we look forward to to competing with all the teams that we play and, and have a great schedule, you know, um, have some midweek games which is always unique for the players, but you know, we, we get to play um the usuals in the state, but then you get to go to Notre Dame, go to Miami, Florida State at home, um, so. You know it’s a great schedule. I’m looking forward to it. I think you know we returned some guys from last year’s team. We felt like we left a lot of meat on the bone. I think Manny’s right on, you know, we played 91 possession games a year ago and we lost 5 in the last 60 seconds, so it was a team that you know was on the verge of something great, ended up with something average. And so, you know, to take the next step we gotta be better finishers. I mean that’s really what it comes down to. We put ourselves in position to win a lot of football games and didn’t get it done and, and ultimately, you know, that’s getting these kids to believe they can, and football is a huge confidence game, you know, it’s a big, big thing for them and so look forward to kicking it off on Thursday night in Raleigh with a really good ECU football team. I know that’ll be a festive atmosphere. Thanks, coach. Last piece of business here, uh, number one, collectively, we all thank you guys for taking a big chunk out of your schedule. Thanks to our friends at Coca-Cola Consolidated for making this magic happen. Reminder to get up here quickly as soon as I give you next year’s event date for those photos. The winner of the autographed football to my right is Riley. Check Riley, what do you think? As Jessica, as say it again. Creech Creek.

Michigan and Western Michigan will open the 2026 season on Saturday, Aug. 29, in Frankfurt, Hesse, Germany, sources told On3.

The game will be held at Deutsche Bank Park, a 55,000-seat retractable roof soccer stadium that has hosted five NFL games.

“I am excited about the football and educational experience this game could provide for our players,” Michigan coach Sherrone Moore said. “We are always looking for unique opportunities to expose our student-athletes to other cultures. In the last 10 years, our program has been to Italy, France and South Africa and this game would provide another chance to grow our international fanbase.”

This will be Michigan’s first international game in the program’s 145-year history. It will also be the fifth college football game held in Germany, but the first between FBS programs and the first in Frankfurt.

“The University of Michigan is one of the few worldwide brands in college athletics and the interest in playing an international game would be unique,” Michigan AD Warde Manuel added. “This would be a great opportunity to teach ‘Go Blue’ to a new group of fans in Germany.”

Michigan will become only the sixth Big Ten member (at the time of the game) to play overseas. The others: Northwestern vs. Nebraska in 2022 in Dublin, Ireland; Penn State played UCF in 2014 in Dublin; and Wisconsin vs. Michigan State in 1993 in Tokyo.

The MAC has had several teams play in bowl games outside the United States, but Western Michigan will be the first MAC team to play an international regular season game. The Broncos have played outside the United States twice before in the 2015 Bahamas Bowl and the 2007 International Bowl in Toronto.

Next year’s contest between UM and WMU was originally scheduled to be played at Michigan Stadium on Sept. 5, 2026, before being moved to Frankfurt. It will be the 29th meeting between the Wolverines and a MAC opponent, but the first not played in Michigan Stadium.

Michigan has won all eight meetings against the Broncos, the last game in 2021.

Next year, TCU and North Carolina also will open the season in Europe. The Horned Frogs and Tar Heels will play on Aug. 29, 2026 in Dublin, Ireland.

Also known as Waldstadion, Deutsche Bank Park most recently held two NFL regular season games in 2023. Deutsche Bank Park is the home field for Eintracht Frankfurt of the Bundesliga, the top tier of the German soccer league.