Wisconsin Basketball Coach Gard Navigating Changing NIL Landscape
The NIL landscape has changed everything when it comes to college sports. Whether you're in favor of student-athletes earning money through their name, image, and likeness, the changes have been dramatic in every way possible.
Wisconsin Badgers head basketball coach Greg Gard is one of the many coaches now looking for regulations in the landscape.
The transfer portal has hit the Badgers hard, losing AJ Storr and Chucky Hepburn, two of the top players in the portal. Rumors suggest that Storr and Hepburn have received lucrative deals to play for other programs.
Gard understands, however, that while he wants the issue solved, complaining about it isn't going to do anything. All he can do as the coach for a program looking to get over the hump is recruit and try to get the best players to play for him, whether it's an even playing field or not.
The storied head coach had the following to say, according to BadgerNotes.
“We can complain about it, but that’s not gonna solve the issue,” Gard said. “We just have to continue to fight every day and put ourselves in the best position to become a good team going forward.”
With Hepburn and Storr leaving, it turned into a money thing instantly for fans. Both players had succeeded under Gard and with the program, so why leave? The same can be said for the nearly 2,000 players in the transfer portal.
Most of the time, it's due for a better opportunity. But when a player like Storr leaves, it's going to be looked at as a financial decision. And in Storr's defense, the young man deserved to be compensated fairly, so if another university can give him that, it's impossible to blame him.
Gard hinted at players leaving for money.
“I wouldn’t say anybody is not following the rules,” Gard said. “There’s so many avenues to this that people on the outside don’t understand. It’s really driven by the market of the players. Yeah, there are programs that maybe color outside the lines. At the end of the day, it’s about the money and where the money goes to."
The Badgers are doing everything they can to give their student athletes money as it's a neccessity they do so if they want to land the top players.
“You continue to do what we’ve done over the last year,” said Gard. “My staff and I have been extremely active in terms of raising NIL dollars and having people impact what we’ve been able to do.
“We’ll continue to be competitive in the NIL world, but there is no ceiling. That’s where it just becomes an arms race.”
Times are changing and with no end in sight, it'll be interesting to see how this all continues to unfold.
JON CONAHAN
Jon Conahan has been covering all major sports since 2019. He is a 2022 graduate of the Bellisario School of Journalism at Penn State University and previously played D1 baseball.