In the span of six days, the University of Miami became the hottest destination in men’s and women’s college basketball.
In case you were too busy cheering for the Heat or poring over mock NFL drafts to notice the jaw-dropping UM basketball news, here’s a quick recap:
April 21: Sharpshooting twin guards Haley and Hanna Cavinder, who have four million TikTok followers and an estimated $1 million in NIL sponsorship deals, announce at 8 p.m. they are transferring from Fresno State to Miami. Fourteen minutes later, billionaire UM booster John Ruiz retweets their announcement with this message: “Young ladies, welcome to the U and welcome to @LifeWallet”. Terms were not disclosed for their deal with Ruiz’s health care company.
April 23: All Big 12 guard Nijel Pack, rated top three among the 1,300 players in the transfer portal, announces he is transferring from Kansas State to Miami. Shortly thereafter, Ruiz posts on Twitter that he signed Pack to a two-year $800,000 NIL deal to promote LifeWallet, and that the deal includes a new car.
April 26: Sun Belt Player of the Year Norchad Omier, the first Nicaraguan to receive a Division I college basketball scholarship, announces he is transferring from Arkansas State to Miami, where he attended Miami Prep school for a year. ESPN.com rated Omier the eighth-best player in the transfer portal. International athletes on F1 student visas are not allowed to accept off-campus employment on U.S. soil, but they are allowed to do promotions and make money in other countries, and Ruiz made it a point to welcome Omier on Twitter, so there could be deals in Nicaragua in the future.
Bottom line: The Hurricanes just landed four of the most talented and high-profile transfers in the country.
The UM women’s team, which has 11,300 Instagram followers, now has a pair of siblings who combined for 34 points per game last season and boast 800,000 Instagram followers. Their four million TikTok followers have clicked “like” more than 97 million times since their dancing videos went viral at the start of the COVID pandemic. Surely, the team’s profile and attendance will grow with the Cavinder twins on the roster, and that should help recruiting in the future.
The men’s team, which lost at least three starters from its Elite Eight roster, will also benefit from the addition of two highly coveted players. And it doesn’t hurt that Pack’s lucrative sponsorship deal is making national headlines, which certainly other recruits and their agents are noticing.
UM basketball is getting four talented athletes. And the athletes will capitalize on their name, image and likeness, which seems only fair considering the top women’s coaches make more than $2 million a year and men’s coaches Bill Self, John Calipari and Tom Izzo make upwards of $8 million a year.
It seems like a win-win. A slam dunk.
And yet, as a 57-year-old dinosaur who was around the UM campus in the mid-80s when Maria Rivera and Kevin Presto were playing for the Hurricanes, I admit I initially raised an eyebrow as I learned of these signings.
If a booster is paying $800,000 for a UM basketball player to promote a company, will coach Jim Larranaga feel pressure to start him? If the Cavinder twins are exposing UM women’s basketball to millions of social media followers, will coach Katie Meier treat them differently than players with more modest followings?
I couldn’t help but wonder, despite all four athletes saying it was the program’s success and top-notch coaches that drew them to Coral Gables, how much the school’s growing reputation as an NIL-rich destination was a factor in their decisions.
But the more I thought about it, the more I began to accept that this is the new world of college athletics, and we need to adapt. Larranaga and Meier are two of the most respected and competitive coaches in the sport, and there is no reason to think they will favor an athlete just because he or she has an endorsement deal. Professional coaches deal with that all the time.
As for athletes choosing schools based at least partly on their earning potential, why not? Young people have every right to capitalize on their popularity.
Haley and Hanna Cavinder are known for their entrepreneurial spirit. There are few athletes in the country who have taken more advantage of the new NIL rules. They were in New York to sign their first deals at midnight July 1, 2021, the day the rules went into effect. Among the companies in their growing portfolio are Boost Mobile, Eastbay, Champs Six Star Nutrition, Celestial Seasonings Teas and the World Wrestling Entertainment.
Leaving an 11-18 Mountain West team for a Miami team that reached the ACC Championship Game and the NCAA Tournament makes sense. Playing in a global city with photo opps galore also makes cents. A lot of cents.
Sadly, female basketball players don’t have the same opportunities to make the astronomical salaries NBA players make, no matter how hard they work or what their shooting percentage is. Kentucky’s Rhyne Howard, the No. 1 pick in the WNBA Draft earlier this month, will make a base salary of $72,141 with the Atlanta Dream. Cade Cunningham, last year’s No. 1 NBA Draft pick, was guaranteed $17.2 million by the Detroit Pistons, and his total rookie contract is worth $36.8 million.
So, the Cavinders are smart to cash in while they can, so long as they continue to be dedicated gym rats and do everything Meier asks of them. That said, I hope fans who show up to see the twins will also start to follow fearless guard Ja’Leah Williams and Destiny Harden, whose 15-0 game-ending run knocked off No. 4 Louisville in the ACC tournament.
Finally, I long for the day when female athletes can be famous and rich just for their basketball skills.
Hey, dinosaurs can dream.
