3 Big Ten Football Programs That Were Way Better Off Before NIL

The Big Ten has been the biggest beneficiary of the NIL/rev-share era of College Football, with many big-money donors/alumni in the tech and business fields stepping up for their alma mater. We just saw the Indiana Hoosiers rise from one of the least-winningest programs in history to a national champion this past winter.

With that said, not every team has benefited from the sport becoming a financial arms race. Life was better for these three B1G teams before the dawn of pay-to-play. Since 2021, it's been a rough go across the Midwest for the following programs.

Wisconsin Badgers

2021 was the last good year for the Wisconsin Badgers, who were still enjoying the fruits of prior recruiting classes before the sport fully shifted to financially-based recruiting.

While the Varsity Collective has done good work raising money, there's still not enough of an investment to free up donors from paying for other things on campus to be serious NIL/rev-share players with the Ohio State Buckeyes, Michigan Wolverines, and the four new West Coast schools.

While the program is promising an increased investment for Luke Fickell for the 2026 College Football season, it may take a new head coach to truly inspire the donor base to rise up and fund the Badgers. It doesn't help matters that basketball receives over $8 million in spending.

It should help that the state Senate approved a bill to provide taxpayer funding for athletic facility debt service and formalize rules around name, image and likeness in mid-March

Michigan State Spartans

Speaking of needing to keep up with spending on the hardwood, Tom Izzo's Michigan State Spartans basketball program will likely always be the featured product in East Lansing.

Like Wisconsin, 2021 was the last time MSU was relevant on the gridiron. Mel Tucker had serious character flaws that eventually tanked the program, and Jonathan Smith didn't do the program any justice as his replacement.

Things could be looking up for Michigan State soon, though, with longtime former Northwestern Wildcats head coach Pat Fitzgerald taking over the program and a $401 million donation, with a $100 million allocation to NIL, arriving in December.

Nebraska Cornhuskers

To be fair to the Nebraska Cornhuskers, things were looking bleak for the program before NIL and rev-share took over. The last year Nebraska football was anywhere near the CFP conversation was the Huskers' nine-win 2016 season.

Still, Scott Frost was in over his head recruiting for the Big Red machine before and after the transition to NIL happened, and NFL veteran coach Matt Rhule has been building the program back up slowly. Nebraska is spending money competitively, but not nearly what the richest schools in the conference are doing.

That may doom the Huskers to Big Ten purgatory indefinitely, perhaps even eventually convincing Nebraska to consider a move back to the Big 12.