More money, more problems? Pitino, Woodson still adjusting on fly after two years of NIL

Iona head coach Rick Pitino addressed NIL concerns in pregame press conference Thursday, likening current state of college basketball to free agency. (Photo by Rick Bozich/WDRB)

By Pete Janny (@pete_janny)

ALBANY, N.Y. — In the summer of 2021, college athletics was thrust into a new space with no precedent. 

Previously, no NCAA-supervised athlete had experienced the rewards of capitalizing on his or her name, image and likeness. As good as the best of the best were, the NCAA still labeled them as amateurs, a distinction that translated to playing for free. However, with the advent of NIL legislation, everything is now on the table. 

On the eve of the NCAA Tournament’s first-round matchups Friday, Rick Pitino and Mike Woodson stepped up to the dais at MVP Arena to discuss their respective teams’ prospects on the court. But Pitino, a pensive and free thinker who plans out every word like he does an inbounds play, was ready to discuss the impact of NIL when asked about it. 

The question to the Iona coach was molded around the spotlight of the NCAA Tournament and how that microscope could inspire big individual performances for the sake of NIL deals. Pitino didn’t buy the seasonal part of it, saying players “just want to advance” in hopes of seeing another day in the Big Dance. Still, for someone who has coached across six decades, Pitino admitted to not fully grasping a topic that lacks synchronicity across the sport as different states have different laws. 

“There are no more amateurs,” Pitino told reporters before his Iona team’s practice Thursday. “I certainly don’t know what to do about it, and the NCAA doesn’t know what to do about it because now everybody is a professional athlete.”

Giving student-athletes the chance to make money was obviously the driving force, stemming from accusations hurled at the NCAA for taking advantage of the commercial value of the players. These days, the NCAA is raking in over a billion dollars a year, mostly from TV deals and corporate sponsorships, but with the competition of TV rights for the NCAA Tournament still the superseding factor. In 2022, CBS and Turner supplied $870 million in total from that revenue pool, according to ESPN. 

But just as the leading governing body and its football and basketball coaches have profited, student-athletes are gung-ho on seeking their own earnings, and it has become a driving factor behind the long line of entries into the transfer portal. 

“This is free agency now,” Pitino said. “Every person that goes in that portal is not only thinking about what coach they want to play for, what style of play, but they’re all free agents.” 

That’s where the boosters come into the picture. Concerns about pay to play were supposed to be assuaged by the opening up of NIL, which was a new outlet for compensation. However, that will not stop successful alumni from big schools from luring in top recruits with the big bucks. And it’s especially real for Indiana and Miami, two programs whose tournament journey begins here in Albany. For example, when Nijel Pack transferred to Miami in the offseason, the terms of the deal were released: $800,000 over two years and a brand-new car. That was a rare case of the financials of an NIL deal being revealed, but it could be just the start of those cases. 

During the Thursday press conferences, Woodson was the first to admit he wasn’t an expert on NIL. His approach to dealing with it was rather simple: Have smart people around you while continuing to build a program around a vibrant alumni and fan base. He already has that part intact at Indiana, or at least the financial backing. Still, Woodson does not want any of it to distract from what he expects of his players on the court and in the classroom.

“That’s not what’s driving me,” Woodson said of NIL’s shadow over recruiting. “You’re going to come play for Mike Woodson, you’re going to have to come to school and get an education and play basketball, and NIL takes care of itself.” 

A lot of NIL guidance is coming from schools as a preemptive tactic to avoid violating state laws, in addition to any school policies in place. Schools consult with lawyers who are experts on the matter to boot. It’s all hands on deck for them, while Woodson is mostly concerning himself with the billion other things that go into running a successful Division I program, especially to meet the standards of a passionate and colossal fan base like Indiana’s. 

“We have people outside that run our NIL,” Woodson said. “And I like to think we’re sitting at the top when it comes to NIL, based on the support of our Indiana base, which is pretty good.”

With power conferences already beginning to coalesce, there are concerns about how NIL could widen the competitive gap between the big fish like Indiana and Miami with the smaller fish like Iona or Drake. So far, it doesn’t seem to be weighing down any well-built and well-coached basketball team a year removed from Saint Peter’s historic run to the Elite Eight. In Thursday’s action alone, 15th-seeded Princeton upended Arizona and 13th-seeded Furman sent Virginia packing. 

Pitino believes NIL is not going anywhere and coaches will have to adapt, that is, if they want to stick around first. Former Villanova head coach Jay Wright was one quality name who left the profession, but for undisclosed reasons.

“I think a lot of coaches have left the business because of that,” Pitino said. “Quality coaches, great people.”

As for some of the big-name coaches assembled in Albany this weekend, they don’t seem to be rushing out the door. Pitino said he hopes to coach for “another 12 years, but I’ll take six or seven.” He acknowledged feeling great physically and mentally, and looks the part of it at 70 years old. Woodson sounds like a man in it for the long haul at his alma mater. Miami head coach Jim Larrañaga chimed in with a declaration to continue for however long the Hurricanes let him. 

UConn head coach Dan Hurley is 50 years old, and not going anywhere because of NIL. In speaking about this year’s Huskies unit to reporters, Hurley commented on Andre Jackson, the hometown kid who hails from Amsterdam, New York, and his example of unselfishness and wanting to win for his teammates. Amateur or professional are words, but those actions speak louder.

“He doesn’t care about his valuation,” Hurley said of Jackson. “I don’t know his NIL valuation.”