What role will NIL play as Ohio State hires its new men's basketball coach?
A coaching search unlike any other in Ohio State history is underway.
The school has fired and hired coaches before and will do it again. It’s the nature of the business, but now the business is changing. For the first time, Ohio State will hire a high-profile coach in the name, image and likeness era, adding a new wrinkle to the process.
All of the usual things will be important in attracting and landing a desirable coaching candidate. They’ll want to walk into a situation with a talent on the roster, ability to recruit at a high level, backing from the administration and high-level facilities. Now, though, where a school stands in the NIL landscape is at worst on equal footing with all those other factors.
“NIL is right up there next to everything,” said Pete Nakos, college sports business and transfer portal reporter for On3.com. “I know some people like to call it pay-for-play and inducements, and I’m not saying it’s not, but this day and age what you’re able to offer financially has everything to do with recruiting and retaining talent in the transfer portal and high school recruiting.”
At Ohio State, that brings the efforts of THE Foundation to the forefront. While there are three primary collectives supporting Ohio State athletes, THE Foundation is the one that works with men’s basketball as well as football.
A non-profit whose donations are tax-deductible, THE Foundation helped the football program enjoy significant financial success after the 2023 season. Now, as college basketball enters the final weeks of the season and the transfer portal looms, the collective has big plans for men’s basketball.
“We were a major part of the success that football had in the offseason as you saw the past month, and we plan on doing the same for basketball,” THE Foundation co-founder and board member Brian Schottenstein said.
Pinning down exact numbers in the world of NIL is challenging. Nakos, who contributes to a daily NIL and sports business newsletter, said he’s been told that the top men’s basketball collectives are in the range of $2-4 million. The higher end of that is what constitutes elite, he said, while noting some rosters are earning around $500,000.
Schottenstein said THE Foundation raised around $3 million for football in January alone and that men’s basketball is tracking toward a similar number. The goal is to have around $3-4 million for men’s basketball to put the program in the best financial situation possible.
How much is ultimately available could depend on who is hired.
“It’s not a binary thing in terms of fundraising for NIL,” said Corey Schottenstein, one of THE Foundation’s board members. “It’s kind of contingent on who they hire. Our donors are interested in a handful candidates – really, three – that would be able to raise a lot more money than if it was someone more random not necessarily tied to the program.”
He declined to provide the names of the three candidates.
Bill Lewis, co-founder of THE Foundation who was also part of The O Foundation, a men’s basketball-exclusive collective that merged with THE Foundation, made it clear that the collective will support whatever decision incoming athletic director Ross Bjork makes when hiring Chris Holtmann’s replacement. THE Foundation partners with players in exchange for them doing charity work, and the collective has already started to talk with players it is currently in contract with about what their situation could look like next year.
It’ll all be easier to do so if the next coach is a candidate their donors are enthused about.
“We’re in a very good position to help what needs to happen at Ohio State for basketball,” Lewis said. “There’s three or four people out there who would probably raise us more money. We’re not going against what Ohio State does at all.”
Once Holtmann was fired, Ohio State’s players could then take advantage of a 30-day window in which they could enter the transfer portal without penalty. That expires March 15, three days before the 45-day window opens for the sport. No Buckeyes immediately entered the portal, and the roster looks set to stay intact through the end of the season.
Lewis and both Schottensteins stressed repeatedly that they are not throwing in the towel on this season and that they will continue to support the program and interim coach Jake Diebler. All of their contracts with current players remain valid and are paid monthly provided the student-athletes remain in Central Ohio.
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Keeping things together whenever the final whistle is blown on the season will in part depend on when the new coach is hired, who they are and whether Ohio State can keep pace in the NIL world. And keeping pace in the NIL world could depend on who is the next coach.
Welcome to the process of hiring a coach in the world of NIL.
“It goes back to the old analogy that the boosters run the coaching search,” Nakos said. “Now it’s legitimately true. I think Ohio State probably has what it needs to be successful. Whoever is taking the job is definitely having a conversation about NIL before they sign the paperwork.”
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This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Here's how NIL, collectives will impact Ohio State coaching search
