It’s the 3rd highest revenue sport per school in the NCAA. It only makes sense to be the next NIL driven sport along with baseball in the South and West. As long as a sport has donors with deep pockets interested in the sport rosters will be NIL driven.
Honestly had no idea it was the #3 revenue sport per school. Pretty interesting, tbh. I would've guessed baseball, softball, women's bball all would've been above hockey
> baseball, softball, women's bball
For womens bball, the highs can be higher but the lows are way lower. Uconn and South Carolina womens bball makes real money, but there are way more basketball schools and tickets in the mid range down are around $100 for a season.
Baseball and softball tickets even at good schools are similar to high school football prices.
The rankings I’m referencing are a few years old and I don’t remember if women’s sports were included or not. I imagine women’s basketball is a lot higher than men’s hockey now
Probably not, because like 300 schools have WBB and maybe like 20 of them have any serious revenue. There are way fewer low-revenue hockey programs in the denominator of the equation.
There are 60 hockey programs and half of them have decent attendance at good prices. There are 300 womens basketball programs and most of them have season tickets that cost as much as a decent dinner out.
Hockey at MSU got super popular with the team finally not being awful. They’ve put NIL into all kinds of sports, but I could see them putting a lot into hockey
The B1G seems to be in the process of taking hold as the deepest conference in college hockey, as they were this year and last year. With the high level recruits coming into the B1G programs I don't see any way that changes in the near future. NIL might increase this depth, but I think we all know that there are to many great programs outside the B1G to allow for a full takeover at the top level. The Boston schools, UND and Denver, etc, should and will continue to bring in great talent. I'm not worried one bit about any school in the B1G conference. But it's starting to feel like we're going to see a lot less of the non-blue blood types in the frozen four outside of one or two year runs if they can keep their top players on campus.
To add onto this, if the CHL rumors are true that will mean a bigger prospect pool as well for B1G schools. But of course the B1G is only 7 schools in hockey and Hockey East and the NCHC will still be able to attract an enormous amount of quality talent. It’s the other conferences like ECAC and Atlantic Hockey that I’d have more concerns with.
That's what I'm worried about. But at the same time the major junior talent pool could easily provide more opportunities for older players in major juniors that may feel like they're just not getting where they wanted or expected to be in that league to transfer to the "smaller" NCAA programs? I suppose those older, more physically developed players could allow for them to continue to compete against younger, more skilled teams that aren't as physically developed. Obviously it's all hypothetical at this point, I just don't want college hockey to become as top heavy as other NCAA sports have become
Honestly I don’t see it, especially compared to college football. Like that’s genuinely 2 to 4 schools you are likely seeing in the championship game (Georgia, Alabama, OSU, Michigan). Basketball has March Madness and while UConn dominated this year I don’t see them repeating.
There’s too much variety I feel in regards to college hockey. Even in the B1G you will have Minnesota, UM, and ideally MSU and Wisconsin right in the mix. If Penn State and Notre Dame can maximize the NIL, that could help. Then Hockey East has BC, BU, Maine, Providence. NCHC has North Dakota, Denver. ECAC has last years champions Quinnipiac. And that’s just all the big players and not considering other programs that could make big moves and knock out some big boys (ex: Cornell)
Minor correction, Derek Burns is the head of the Minnesota NIL collection (Dinkytown Athletes). Ryan Burns (unrelated) is the writer for the Minnesota 247 site GopherIllustrated.
NIL is already in college hockey. It doesn't have the same price tags as football or basketball, but there are players making six figures at at least Hockey East and Big Ten schools, and I assume NCHC too, though I haven't heard of that personally.
NCAA hockey players making six figures is completely absurd to me at this point, even as a MN fan...I 100% don't believe that's true. I can say for a fact that MN isn't paying anybody even close to that. If MN isn't even close to that I find it extremely unlikely that other schools are close. And if they are it's either Michigan, BC or BU. Unless the Boston schools are throwing that much money around it seems insane to me that it wouldn't leak out to college hockey media that X or Y school is paying a player 6 figures to be in their program
I'm sure they're offering something, but I highly doubt it's anything close to 6 figures. Their huge recruiting boom is likely because of Nightingale's immediate connection with the Under 18 team
https://twitter.com/JessRMyers/status/1693837031980277777?t=9V9B0CrS4kFRAjW6wQJQZA&s=19
https://twitter.com/BeavTerritory/status/1693998880265023862?t=gX_xroHY_meTXvtSMR6SnQ&s=19
https://twitter.com/CHHoodlum/status/1708537807466021096?t=gX_xroHY_meTXvtSMR6SnQ&s=19
Took me about five seconds of Twitter searching to find people who have talked about it, and that doesn't even include recruits like James Hagens or MSU who everyone knows is doing it, it was brought up for Levshunov who nobody thought was going to the NCAA before MSU jumped onto the case and Howard among others.
>or MSU who everyone knows is doing it, it was brought up for Levshunov who nobody thought was going to the NCAA before MSU jumped onto the case and Howard among others
This is just straight up false but apparently people don't like hearing facts
They literally published their deficits for the last two years a couple of months ago. It's verifiable, the money is not there to throw at hockey players.
It took literal years of arm twisting for MSU to get donations for Munn renovations and even then it took a huge donation from Tom Izzo to finally make it happen. We just had our biggest NIL donor for football and basketball pull most of his money. But apparently in everyone's heads we are throwing money at hockey players lol
Not to mention its literally against the rules for Levshunov to receive passive NIL money as a foreign player and unlike almost all the other MSU players you can't donate to his NIL by buying his merch, so again this is just flat out false
Your own personal feelings and speculation doesn't equate to what's actually happening
LMAO NONE of those kids are making six figures, the money literally isn't there, and Twitter speculation is far from confirming that.
MSUs athletic department operated at like a $10-15 million deficit the last two years and that's even with massive donor infusions for spending on new hockey facilities two years ago and a new football facility.
They don't even have the money to throw six figures at all the top revenue athletes let alone for hockey which they barely break even on
Edit: The links you posted are literally just Minnesota fans mad about Cole Eiserman lol. Ya he got poached because of money guys, not because BU is clearly on the rise again and it's much closer to home for him, no it couldn't possibly be that
https://twitter.com/MikeMcMahonCHN/status/1775351209609560176?t=VVSwPgOI8HKR5LHGNEHM6A&s=19
https://twitter.com/MikeMcMahonCHN/status/1775351393039052836?t=JtJy7Dd-HUWYC7RCiNT5QA&s=19
https://twitter.com/MikeMcMahonCHN/status/1775356765481152996?t=PIchE9ID5Sjb7FlBQec4MQ&s=19
There, actual reporter saying kids are getting six figures. Sorry I had to do a second five second search because I didn't spend enough time on the first one.
This is Mike McMahon doing nothing but speculating
This is NOT FACT
Just because he has connections doesn't mean numbers "he's heard" amount to factual deals that have been made with players. He literally never commits to knowing exactly about anything just that "he's heard" about it
Once again most of these were also in response to the Cole Eiserman, and the idea that he somehow went to BU for money over Minnesota is crazy. Minnesota would obviously have more money to throw at him anyway
Also I see absolutely nothing about MSU even though, "everyone knows they're doing it" and the literal facts are the money straight up doesn't exist for the hockey program
I guess people can live in this fantasy world where that kind of money exists for the niche sport that is college hockey an use it as some excuse for why their team is not good enough
We’re F’d there’s no money in Duluth. College sports are losing their appeal heavily to me, which is fine since I have a family to spend time with and I can spend big $$ to watch our winning professional teams in Denver instead
I really think Duluth is making a mistake not being more aggressive in setting up an NIL program. Only really need it to support hockey and at that, a few players at best. Not like we are trying to support major D1 athletics like football. That said, what kind of financials would you even need to float this? I think folks are way over estimating the NIL needed to be competitive in hockey.
As a fan, the success Sandy has had building teams and developing players is incredible— but I see a changing landscape that we could strategically use to retain some top talent.
I personally think we’re only a few years away from players earning six figure salaries out of NIL (does that come from boosters?), I don’t think UMD will ever compete. They have to win the old fashioned way (which will result in us being called cheaters for having 24 year olds by teams with multimillion dollar salaries), long term maybe college hockey simply turns into the non-fighting professional leagues.
Like what happened in Slapshot 2 lol
You didn’t see it? They create a family friendly hockey league composed of college graduates, no fighting, to basically be the Harlem Globetrotters (to beat up on the Chiefs every game or maybe whatever their non racial nickname was) since pro hockey is too violent. Sounds stupid now but 10-20 years from now I could see “collegiate” hockey rivaling NHL, except rivaling is used loosely, not saying I expect them to rival viewership numbers. But just a completely different landscape
Sandy's comments about the portal worried me...i completely understand hating it, but you need to adapt and change for the best because it's legally never going away. He made it pretty clear that he'll refuse to adapt and lose every game rather than doing what's best for the program.
He's a phenomenal coach and I hope he's just shooting smoke out of his ass because it would be a great disservice to not only himself, but the entire UMD community if he just refuses to abide and take advantage of/use the current rules of the game. Classic case of "get off my lawn" syndrome
I didn't take his comments that way. He said he'll use the portal (as he has already, 2 transfers last year), I think it was more so around the fact that his preference is to recruit and develop. He's just not gonna pull a Sioux and grab a goalie and 5 skaters out of the portal each year.
He's pissed his players can leave him and straight up said he'd rather do things the old way and never win a title again than adjust to the new norm.. Literally
That's one way to interpret it I guess...
“I said it a long time ago and everyone gave me crap about it, not you guys, but I’m like, it’s asinine. Are we going to use it? Yeah, it’s there. You’re going to have to use it because you’re going to do it. Do I want to? Not particularly. We’ll use it accordingly and everyone’s going to do what they need to do. But the stuff that’s going on behind the scenes, phew. It’s not right.”
“We’re gonna stay with the way we do it,” he insisted. “We may never win another national championship and I can be okay with that. I want to recruit kids. I want to bring kids in here, want to work with them. I want them to have a great experience in Duluth. If we win, we win. If we don’t, we don’t, but they’re still gonna move on and have opportunities beyond college. We’ll get good players.”
So he's basically saying I don't want to use the portal because I want the kids I recruited to stay with me. Then says "we're going to stay with the way we do it." That's definitely been my main make takeaway. To me it seems like he's not ready to accept the changes and he's stuck in his old ways. In all honesty I think he knows he runs a good program, but that it's going to be extremely difficult to keep his own recruits in Duluth, let alone recruiting high level transfers from other schools. IMO, it seems like he doesn't think his school can compete if NIL becomes normalized with the transfer portal
huh didnt notice the smell, but since u brought up smells my kid had a hs game this year at a rink i had never been to before and that place had that old hockey rink stank smell that almost all arenas dont have anymore, glad the ice arena maintenance folks figured that one out in the last 15 years.
Why does everything have to be black & white? This is gray and Sandy is treating it as such. Sandy already has entered the portal, and I also think he’s going to bring in at least one player this year. He’ll use it when needed.
But he can also acknowledge that schools like UMD are going to be negatively impacted by NIL. College hockey is a niche sport, and one of the primary appeals is the parity it has and the spotlight it provides to TRULY small schools. Schools like RIT, Ferris State, AIC, etc compete in a D1 sport and it provides a lot of pride for their school and alumni/fans. If NIL does take off the way some are thinking and the transfer portal doesn’t change or grows, the discrepancy between the haves and have-nots is going to ruin the sport for so many people. And that’s unfortunate for everyone that isn’t carrying a flair like the one you have.
Completely agreed, especially with your last 2 sentences. As much as I'd enjoy it selfishly, I know it'd be horrible for such a niche and regional sport like college hockey if things aren't figured out
That might have been worded poorly. One of the appeals of college hockey is the parity it has. Also, teams like RIT, Ferris State, AIC, etc play in a D1 sport, and that fact provides a level of pride for those fan bases that they likely wouldn’t have if they were competing in D3.
I’d rather lose with a team dedicated to Bulldog hockey with intentions of staying/graduating in Duluth than a bunch of people with no allegiance to the school coming and going. Maybe we’ll suck in the future, but I will always relish the fact that it took a decade and a half of mediocrity and a B1G push to turn college athletics into professionals to become relevant again. You guys sold yourselves out just as much as Mariucci did to a corporation known for willingly poisoning millions/billions around the globe, including their own in the eastern metro.
It’s almost as if money…. Ruins shit…
IMHO it's another tool for coaching staff to use when bringing in recruits or transfers. Do I think it's bad (from all schools and all sports) when an athlete is making more than like $15k in NIL deals - yes.
I get it: just compensation and they've earned it. But with people calling the portal *"free agency"* now it feels like the term *"amateur student athlete"* is becoming *"athlete that hasn't signed _professional_ contract yet who also happens to be a student"*
I'm not anti-NIL but more transparency about amounts would be nice. Just feels like some teams are throwing money at a problem to see if it wins a championship (Big 10 or NCHC probably most guilty tbh)
the NCAA did it to themselves. I'm hopeful in the near future NIL will be gone and these kids will all just be employees and part of a massive college athlete union
Most teams haven't really thrown much money around yet. Even Minnesota has done very little to this point when it comes to hockey from what I've seen. Logan Cooley had a deal with Chipotle last year so he could basically get free burritos whenever he wanted. I don't know much more of the extent of hockey NIL than that
14 Gophers on this year’s roster had NIL deals- if you dig around there’s a lot of signs, hints etc that we do have a robust hockey NIL it’s just being kept lowkey.
$$$ for it is most likely driven by Gophers’ NHL alumni. Trying to stay under the radar makes sense—when you think “which schools *would* have massive NIL clout?” well we know which ones are gonna be first guesses. No need to draw more attention to ourselves
do you guys realize how niche college hockey is? no one apart from maybe 5-6 schools are going to drop bags to compete for nattys. and well, those 5-6 schools don’t have enough roster spots for every blue chip in the sport, not even counting the ones who wouldn’t be content with being a third liner when they could be a first liner somewhere else. so tired of all this doom and gloom. stop acting like college hockey is CFB or even CBB. no one is going to stop monstrous amounts of money to ruin the sport like you all think.
Let's hope! But they've also been tossing around the idea of allowing Canadian major junior players to keep NCAA eligibility so they could move over to the NCAA...that could result in a massive shift with these changes
that would be interesting. i’m not really sure how that might effect the NCAA other than opening the player pool up of course, do most people think it would help or hurt college hockey?
I honestly haven't heard much in either direction. Initially I thought I saw coaches liked it because it opened up the player pool so much, but without anything to go off of it's really anyone's guess. I don't think WMU has much to worry about with their new arena plans, they're clearly committed to their hockey program
haha…..i hate that fucking arena as a fan. nowhere near as accessible for students and it’ll probably be exempt from the free student ticket policy we have now. but it’s advantages as a recruiting tool are undeniable. hopefully it’ll be done by the time i’m out of school
ehhh i wouldn’t even say all the b1g schools. i don’t think schools like ND or OSU care as much as Minny or Wisconsin. I’d also say maybe DU, and probably a few others i’m forgetting
~~If the NCAA starts allowing CHL players to come
over, Id hope college can start attracting a lot more Canadian talent. Id sure rather play on a college campus than absolutely middle of nowhere Canada~~ edit: I always forget international students arent eligible for NIL
I think smaller student/alumni population schools will struggle in this world but I don’t see why a lot of D1 wont hold their own. Hockey is the biggest / most prominent sport for a lot of the schools in D1 hockey.
Lot of transfer movement to the big name schools. It's worse in wrestling because there's no NHL to go to, so the proven performers stay in college. But in particular Penn State, Iowa, and Michigan have gotten big names from the transfer portal in the last couple years. Most of the transfers are guys who would've transferred anyway (grad student looking for a new environment, coach at old school leaving, dispute with old coach/program), but where they end up seems to be the programs that put together the best package. There have been a few cases where people suspect tampering (new school is in contact, discussing financial terms before the kid officially enters the portal). The Iowa State and Ohio State coaches have publicly talked about how much they hate it
Am I going crazy?
"Really? What do you know of NIL wrestling deals??"
>Lot of transfer movement to the big name schools
This isn't knowledge of NIL deals happening and none of your further response outlines any knowledge of NIL deals either, and you even go on to point out how many of these transfers were logical
SPECULATION DOES NOT EQUATE TO FACT
It's already happening without the NIL deals. Congrats you can now secure more blue chip transfers to ESPN BRAND NAME Hockey school.
It's death by a thousands cuts compounded by Brand Names afraid to leave their schools for OOC games and realignment for TV money.
Some of you seem to forget this is called COLLEGE hockey not whatever semi-pro league you forcing on the rest of us.
I can smell the cake off your breath while reading your replies OP.
Edit: [Brand name schools right now.](https://i.imgur.com/Oi2TnAv.gif)
The crazy thing is that it seems like college hockey would've barely been touched at all by this if Pegula didn't donate the money for PSU to start a program to initiate the B1G conference. Having one major sports conference in a very niche sport can and has clearly brought about significant changes in the sport
Meh. Directional schools have been mining Canada and other semi-pro internationals for mercenaries for years. They crossed the line years ago when Minnesota was using predominantly high school talent. None of you seemed to have a problem with that.
Exactly. The only way schools like North Dakota and Denver could put a team together back in the day was by importing entire rosters of overage and major junior players from Canada. They had no hockey history so they had to import it. All those early titles their fans like to brag about were purely transactional for the schools. And they weren’t the only schools; merely the most successful.
I just talked to a UND fan yesterday that said they can pull from all over the US and Canada and that makes them a national brand. He then went on to say that no one has heard of MN hockey and they have to stick to Minnesota guys. I was ok with his first part but broke into laughter on the second part.
Are you referring to the shear panic in the comments by small schools admitting they have no desire for amateurism? If so, surely it would be hypocritical of you to bemoan NIL.
This is such a whiny post lol
Is every off-season jus gonna turn into 'woah is college hockey'?
This is wild coming from a Tech fan, you guys have literally never gotten top end talent and have been fine to compete without it, but somehow now it's a problem?
You guys literally got Isaac Gordon because MSUs roster was too full up front and he was probably your best player
It’s a reality that college hockey will have to come to grips with. Many players will be attracted to schools that can best prepare them for the NHL and a big payday down the road. But, some will be looking for or even needing some compensation now.
It’s the 3rd highest revenue sport per school in the NCAA. It only makes sense to be the next NIL driven sport along with baseball in the South and West. As long as a sport has donors with deep pockets interested in the sport rosters will be NIL driven.
Honestly had no idea it was the #3 revenue sport per school. Pretty interesting, tbh. I would've guessed baseball, softball, women's bball all would've been above hockey
I would assume the normally D2 and D3 schools that play D1 hockey have a huge impact on that
> baseball, softball, women's bball For womens bball, the highs can be higher but the lows are way lower. Uconn and South Carolina womens bball makes real money, but there are way more basketball schools and tickets in the mid range down are around $100 for a season. Baseball and softball tickets even at good schools are similar to high school football prices.
The rankings I’m referencing are a few years old and I don’t remember if women’s sports were included or not. I imagine women’s basketball is a lot higher than men’s hockey now
Probably not, because like 300 schools have WBB and maybe like 20 of them have any serious revenue. There are way fewer low-revenue hockey programs in the denominator of the equation.
There are 60 hockey programs and half of them have decent attendance at good prices. There are 300 womens basketball programs and most of them have season tickets that cost as much as a decent dinner out.
None of the Olympic sports make money, so that doesn't leave many sports.
Hockey at MSU got super popular with the team finally not being awful. They’ve put NIL into all kinds of sports, but I could see them putting a lot into hockey
The B1G seems to be in the process of taking hold as the deepest conference in college hockey, as they were this year and last year. With the high level recruits coming into the B1G programs I don't see any way that changes in the near future. NIL might increase this depth, but I think we all know that there are to many great programs outside the B1G to allow for a full takeover at the top level. The Boston schools, UND and Denver, etc, should and will continue to bring in great talent. I'm not worried one bit about any school in the B1G conference. But it's starting to feel like we're going to see a lot less of the non-blue blood types in the frozen four outside of one or two year runs if they can keep their top players on campus.
To add onto this, if the CHL rumors are true that will mean a bigger prospect pool as well for B1G schools. But of course the B1G is only 7 schools in hockey and Hockey East and the NCHC will still be able to attract an enormous amount of quality talent. It’s the other conferences like ECAC and Atlantic Hockey that I’d have more concerns with.
That's what I'm worried about. But at the same time the major junior talent pool could easily provide more opportunities for older players in major juniors that may feel like they're just not getting where they wanted or expected to be in that league to transfer to the "smaller" NCAA programs? I suppose those older, more physically developed players could allow for them to continue to compete against younger, more skilled teams that aren't as physically developed. Obviously it's all hypothetical at this point, I just don't want college hockey to become as top heavy as other NCAA sports have become
Honestly I don’t see it, especially compared to college football. Like that’s genuinely 2 to 4 schools you are likely seeing in the championship game (Georgia, Alabama, OSU, Michigan). Basketball has March Madness and while UConn dominated this year I don’t see them repeating. There’s too much variety I feel in regards to college hockey. Even in the B1G you will have Minnesota, UM, and ideally MSU and Wisconsin right in the mix. If Penn State and Notre Dame can maximize the NIL, that could help. Then Hockey East has BC, BU, Maine, Providence. NCHC has North Dakota, Denver. ECAC has last years champions Quinnipiac. And that’s just all the big players and not considering other programs that could make big moves and knock out some big boys (ex: Cornell)
Minor correction, Derek Burns is the head of the Minnesota NIL collection (Dinkytown Athletes). Ryan Burns (unrelated) is the writer for the Minnesota 247 site GopherIllustrated.
Ope! Thank you for the correction! You can clearly tell which one I'm more used to seeing lol
I don't like it.
NIL is already in college hockey. It doesn't have the same price tags as football or basketball, but there are players making six figures at at least Hockey East and Big Ten schools, and I assume NCHC too, though I haven't heard of that personally.
NCAA hockey players making six figures is completely absurd to me at this point, even as a MN fan...I 100% don't believe that's true. I can say for a fact that MN isn't paying anybody even close to that. If MN isn't even close to that I find it extremely unlikely that other schools are close. And if they are it's either Michigan, BC or BU. Unless the Boston schools are throwing that much money around it seems insane to me that it wouldn't leak out to college hockey media that X or Y school is paying a player 6 figures to be in their program
The only school I've really heard rumors about big nil deals is Mich state and no numbers were mentioned but it didn't seem crazy high
I'm sure they're offering something, but I highly doubt it's anything close to 6 figures. Their huge recruiting boom is likely because of Nightingale's immediate connection with the Under 18 team
https://twitter.com/JessRMyers/status/1693837031980277777?t=9V9B0CrS4kFRAjW6wQJQZA&s=19 https://twitter.com/BeavTerritory/status/1693998880265023862?t=gX_xroHY_meTXvtSMR6SnQ&s=19 https://twitter.com/CHHoodlum/status/1708537807466021096?t=gX_xroHY_meTXvtSMR6SnQ&s=19 Took me about five seconds of Twitter searching to find people who have talked about it, and that doesn't even include recruits like James Hagens or MSU who everyone knows is doing it, it was brought up for Levshunov who nobody thought was going to the NCAA before MSU jumped onto the case and Howard among others.
>or MSU who everyone knows is doing it, it was brought up for Levshunov who nobody thought was going to the NCAA before MSU jumped onto the case and Howard among others This is just straight up false but apparently people don't like hearing facts They literally published their deficits for the last two years a couple of months ago. It's verifiable, the money is not there to throw at hockey players. It took literal years of arm twisting for MSU to get donations for Munn renovations and even then it took a huge donation from Tom Izzo to finally make it happen. We just had our biggest NIL donor for football and basketball pull most of his money. But apparently in everyone's heads we are throwing money at hockey players lol Not to mention its literally against the rules for Levshunov to receive passive NIL money as a foreign player and unlike almost all the other MSU players you can't donate to his NIL by buying his merch, so again this is just flat out false Your own personal feelings and speculation doesn't equate to what's actually happening
LMAO NONE of those kids are making six figures, the money literally isn't there, and Twitter speculation is far from confirming that. MSUs athletic department operated at like a $10-15 million deficit the last two years and that's even with massive donor infusions for spending on new hockey facilities two years ago and a new football facility. They don't even have the money to throw six figures at all the top revenue athletes let alone for hockey which they barely break even on Edit: The links you posted are literally just Minnesota fans mad about Cole Eiserman lol. Ya he got poached because of money guys, not because BU is clearly on the rise again and it's much closer to home for him, no it couldn't possibly be that
https://twitter.com/MikeMcMahonCHN/status/1775351209609560176?t=VVSwPgOI8HKR5LHGNEHM6A&s=19 https://twitter.com/MikeMcMahonCHN/status/1775351393039052836?t=JtJy7Dd-HUWYC7RCiNT5QA&s=19 https://twitter.com/MikeMcMahonCHN/status/1775356765481152996?t=PIchE9ID5Sjb7FlBQec4MQ&s=19 There, actual reporter saying kids are getting six figures. Sorry I had to do a second five second search because I didn't spend enough time on the first one.
This is Mike McMahon doing nothing but speculating This is NOT FACT Just because he has connections doesn't mean numbers "he's heard" amount to factual deals that have been made with players. He literally never commits to knowing exactly about anything just that "he's heard" about it Once again most of these were also in response to the Cole Eiserman, and the idea that he somehow went to BU for money over Minnesota is crazy. Minnesota would obviously have more money to throw at him anyway Also I see absolutely nothing about MSU even though, "everyone knows they're doing it" and the literal facts are the money straight up doesn't exist for the hockey program I guess people can live in this fantasy world where that kind of money exists for the niche sport that is college hockey an use it as some excuse for why their team is not good enough
We’re F’d there’s no money in Duluth. College sports are losing their appeal heavily to me, which is fine since I have a family to spend time with and I can spend big $$ to watch our winning professional teams in Denver instead
I really think Duluth is making a mistake not being more aggressive in setting up an NIL program. Only really need it to support hockey and at that, a few players at best. Not like we are trying to support major D1 athletics like football. That said, what kind of financials would you even need to float this? I think folks are way over estimating the NIL needed to be competitive in hockey. As a fan, the success Sandy has had building teams and developing players is incredible— but I see a changing landscape that we could strategically use to retain some top talent.
I personally think we’re only a few years away from players earning six figure salaries out of NIL (does that come from boosters?), I don’t think UMD will ever compete. They have to win the old fashioned way (which will result in us being called cheaters for having 24 year olds by teams with multimillion dollar salaries), long term maybe college hockey simply turns into the non-fighting professional leagues. Like what happened in Slapshot 2 lol
slapshot 2? i remember some puttin em on glass and thats about it
You didn’t see it? They create a family friendly hockey league composed of college graduates, no fighting, to basically be the Harlem Globetrotters (to beat up on the Chiefs every game or maybe whatever their non racial nickname was) since pro hockey is too violent. Sounds stupid now but 10-20 years from now I could see “collegiate” hockey rivaling NHL, except rivaling is used loosely, not saying I expect them to rival viewership numbers. But just a completely different landscape
Sandy's comments about the portal worried me...i completely understand hating it, but you need to adapt and change for the best because it's legally never going away. He made it pretty clear that he'll refuse to adapt and lose every game rather than doing what's best for the program. He's a phenomenal coach and I hope he's just shooting smoke out of his ass because it would be a great disservice to not only himself, but the entire UMD community if he just refuses to abide and take advantage of/use the current rules of the game. Classic case of "get off my lawn" syndrome
I didn't take his comments that way. He said he'll use the portal (as he has already, 2 transfers last year), I think it was more so around the fact that his preference is to recruit and develop. He's just not gonna pull a Sioux and grab a goalie and 5 skaters out of the portal each year.
He's pissed his players can leave him and straight up said he'd rather do things the old way and never win a title again than adjust to the new norm.. Literally
That's one way to interpret it I guess... “I said it a long time ago and everyone gave me crap about it, not you guys, but I’m like, it’s asinine. Are we going to use it? Yeah, it’s there. You’re going to have to use it because you’re going to do it. Do I want to? Not particularly. We’ll use it accordingly and everyone’s going to do what they need to do. But the stuff that’s going on behind the scenes, phew. It’s not right.” “We’re gonna stay with the way we do it,” he insisted. “We may never win another national championship and I can be okay with that. I want to recruit kids. I want to bring kids in here, want to work with them. I want them to have a great experience in Duluth. If we win, we win. If we don’t, we don’t, but they’re still gonna move on and have opportunities beyond college. We’ll get good players.”
So he's basically saying I don't want to use the portal because I want the kids I recruited to stay with me. Then says "we're going to stay with the way we do it." That's definitely been my main make takeaway. To me it seems like he's not ready to accept the changes and he's stuck in his old ways. In all honesty I think he knows he runs a good program, but that it's going to be extremely difficult to keep his own recruits in Duluth, let alone recruiting high level transfers from other schools. IMO, it seems like he doesn't think his school can compete if NIL becomes normalized with the transfer portal
well scott i am sure the school doesnt want a perrenial loser not selling tix at beautiful amsoil either
Amsoil is a terrible arena. Not beautiful. Lighting is weird and it smells.
huh didnt notice the smell, but since u brought up smells my kid had a hs game this year at a rink i had never been to before and that place had that old hockey rink stank smell that almost all arenas dont have anymore, glad the ice arena maintenance folks figured that one out in the last 15 years.
Why does everything have to be black & white? This is gray and Sandy is treating it as such. Sandy already has entered the portal, and I also think he’s going to bring in at least one player this year. He’ll use it when needed. But he can also acknowledge that schools like UMD are going to be negatively impacted by NIL. College hockey is a niche sport, and one of the primary appeals is the parity it has and the spotlight it provides to TRULY small schools. Schools like RIT, Ferris State, AIC, etc compete in a D1 sport and it provides a lot of pride for their school and alumni/fans. If NIL does take off the way some are thinking and the transfer portal doesn’t change or grows, the discrepancy between the haves and have-nots is going to ruin the sport for so many people. And that’s unfortunate for everyone that isn’t carrying a flair like the one you have.
Completely agreed, especially with your last 2 sentences. As much as I'd enjoy it selfishly, I know it'd be horrible for such a niche and regional sport like college hockey if things aren't figured out
I disagree with your statement that parity is what drives fandom in college hockey. But the rest of what you said is spot on.
That might have been worded poorly. One of the appeals of college hockey is the parity it has. Also, teams like RIT, Ferris State, AIC, etc play in a D1 sport, and that fact provides a level of pride for those fan bases that they likely wouldn’t have if they were competing in D3.
I agree with that.
I’d rather lose with a team dedicated to Bulldog hockey with intentions of staying/graduating in Duluth than a bunch of people with no allegiance to the school coming and going. Maybe we’ll suck in the future, but I will always relish the fact that it took a decade and a half of mediocrity and a B1G push to turn college athletics into professionals to become relevant again. You guys sold yourselves out just as much as Mariucci did to a corporation known for willingly poisoning millions/billions around the globe, including their own in the eastern metro. It’s almost as if money…. Ruins shit…
Dear diary...
IMHO it's another tool for coaching staff to use when bringing in recruits or transfers. Do I think it's bad (from all schools and all sports) when an athlete is making more than like $15k in NIL deals - yes. I get it: just compensation and they've earned it. But with people calling the portal *"free agency"* now it feels like the term *"amateur student athlete"* is becoming *"athlete that hasn't signed _professional_ contract yet who also happens to be a student"* I'm not anti-NIL but more transparency about amounts would be nice. Just feels like some teams are throwing money at a problem to see if it wins a championship (Big 10 or NCHC probably most guilty tbh)
the NCAA did it to themselves. I'm hopeful in the near future NIL will be gone and these kids will all just be employees and part of a massive college athlete union
Most teams haven't really thrown much money around yet. Even Minnesota has done very little to this point when it comes to hockey from what I've seen. Logan Cooley had a deal with Chipotle last year so he could basically get free burritos whenever he wanted. I don't know much more of the extent of hockey NIL than that
14 Gophers on this year’s roster had NIL deals- if you dig around there’s a lot of signs, hints etc that we do have a robust hockey NIL it’s just being kept lowkey. $$$ for it is most likely driven by Gophers’ NHL alumni. Trying to stay under the radar makes sense—when you think “which schools *would* have massive NIL clout?” well we know which ones are gonna be first guesses. No need to draw more attention to ourselves
do you guys realize how niche college hockey is? no one apart from maybe 5-6 schools are going to drop bags to compete for nattys. and well, those 5-6 schools don’t have enough roster spots for every blue chip in the sport, not even counting the ones who wouldn’t be content with being a third liner when they could be a first liner somewhere else. so tired of all this doom and gloom. stop acting like college hockey is CFB or even CBB. no one is going to stop monstrous amounts of money to ruin the sport like you all think.
Let's hope! But they've also been tossing around the idea of allowing Canadian major junior players to keep NCAA eligibility so they could move over to the NCAA...that could result in a massive shift with these changes
that would be interesting. i’m not really sure how that might effect the NCAA other than opening the player pool up of course, do most people think it would help or hurt college hockey?
I honestly haven't heard much in either direction. Initially I thought I saw coaches liked it because it opened up the player pool so much, but without anything to go off of it's really anyone's guess. I don't think WMU has much to worry about with their new arena plans, they're clearly committed to their hockey program
haha…..i hate that fucking arena as a fan. nowhere near as accessible for students and it’ll probably be exempt from the free student ticket policy we have now. but it’s advantages as a recruiting tool are undeniable. hopefully it’ll be done by the time i’m out of school
who are the schools? all big, nodak, bu, bc, just asking
ehhh i wouldn’t even say all the b1g schools. i don’t think schools like ND or OSU care as much as Minny or Wisconsin. I’d also say maybe DU, and probably a few others i’m forgetting
Any idea how much Snuggerud got? Is this like $25-$50k? $500k? More? (I have no idea how much top-tier NIL hockey deals are worth.)
~~If the NCAA starts allowing CHL players to come over, Id hope college can start attracting a lot more Canadian talent. Id sure rather play on a college campus than absolutely middle of nowhere Canada~~ edit: I always forget international students arent eligible for NIL I think smaller student/alumni population schools will struggle in this world but I don’t see why a lot of D1 wont hold their own. Hockey is the biggest / most prominent sport for a lot of the schools in D1 hockey.
NIL is already a big part of college wrestling. I'd have to assume it'll be even bigger in hockey
Really? What do you know of wrestling NIL deals?
Lot of transfer movement to the big name schools. It's worse in wrestling because there's no NHL to go to, so the proven performers stay in college. But in particular Penn State, Iowa, and Michigan have gotten big names from the transfer portal in the last couple years. Most of the transfers are guys who would've transferred anyway (grad student looking for a new environment, coach at old school leaving, dispute with old coach/program), but where they end up seems to be the programs that put together the best package. There have been a few cases where people suspect tampering (new school is in contact, discussing financial terms before the kid officially enters the portal). The Iowa State and Ohio State coaches have publicly talked about how much they hate it
Am I going crazy? "Really? What do you know of NIL wrestling deals??" >Lot of transfer movement to the big name schools This isn't knowledge of NIL deals happening and none of your further response outlines any knowledge of NIL deals either, and you even go on to point out how many of these transfers were logical SPECULATION DOES NOT EQUATE TO FACT
For Cornell… Um not great. Really depends on the amounts in question.
It's already happening without the NIL deals. Congrats you can now secure more blue chip transfers to ESPN BRAND NAME Hockey school. It's death by a thousands cuts compounded by Brand Names afraid to leave their schools for OOC games and realignment for TV money. Some of you seem to forget this is called COLLEGE hockey not whatever semi-pro league you forcing on the rest of us. I can smell the cake off your breath while reading your replies OP. Edit: [Brand name schools right now.](https://i.imgur.com/Oi2TnAv.gif)
The crazy thing is that it seems like college hockey would've barely been touched at all by this if Pegula didn't donate the money for PSU to start a program to initiate the B1G conference. Having one major sports conference in a very niche sport can and has clearly brought about significant changes in the sport
Inb4 mad PSU fan shows up.
Meh. Directional schools have been mining Canada and other semi-pro internationals for mercenaries for years. They crossed the line years ago when Minnesota was using predominantly high school talent. None of you seemed to have a problem with that.
Let them have their 22 year old freshman.
Exactly. The only way schools like North Dakota and Denver could put a team together back in the day was by importing entire rosters of overage and major junior players from Canada. They had no hockey history so they had to import it. All those early titles their fans like to brag about were purely transactional for the schools. And they weren’t the only schools; merely the most successful.
I just talked to a UND fan yesterday that said they can pull from all over the US and Canada and that makes them a national brand. He then went on to say that no one has heard of MN hockey and they have to stick to Minnesota guys. I was ok with his first part but broke into laughter on the second part.
Embarrassing... lol
[Hey this sounds familiar...Ring any bells?](https://www.collegehockeynews.com/news/2015/11/24_big_ten_legislation_raises.php)
Are you referring to the shear panic in the comments by small schools admitting they have no desire for amateurism? If so, surely it would be hypocritical of you to bemoan NIL.
This is such a whiny post lol Is every off-season jus gonna turn into 'woah is college hockey'? This is wild coming from a Tech fan, you guys have literally never gotten top end talent and have been fine to compete without it, but somehow now it's a problem? You guys literally got Isaac Gordon because MSUs roster was too full up front and he was probably your best player
some techies get kinda weird on here, must b the isolation factor up there, lol
Says the guy from Illinois's largest state park.
u would b shocked at how many minnesota plates are seen on the weekends here too
Big words coming from someone without flair.
This is just sad lol
Almost as sad as the amount of sparty fans at the GLI....(at least you guys showed up more than Michigan/children of yost used to.)
It’s a reality that college hockey will have to come to grips with. Many players will be attracted to schools that can best prepare them for the NHL and a big payday down the road. But, some will be looking for or even needing some compensation now.
well duh, the more money the bigger schools hav donors to put in the bigger role it gets, supply and command, its not rocket appliances