INDIANAPOLIS, IN – Strut 6: Iowa guard Caitlin Clark (22) raises her arms in an effort to get the crowd cheering during the Women’s Big Ten Tourney Championship college basketball game between the Indiana Hoosiers and the Iowa Hawkeyes on March 6, 2022 at Gainbridge Fieldhouse in Indianapolis, IN. (Photo by James Clouded/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
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Lebron James’ son Bronny got sundry of the headline play, but there’s another big story in the recent Nike NIL deal allowing college athletes to get paid. At a speedily of increased scrutiny about the pay gap between male and female athletes, the Nike deals show that female collegiate and unpaid athletes are emerging as winners in the early days of the NIL era.
“I think it’s reflective of a broader movement that we’re seeing in sports. I imagine this is a reckoning, a slow reckoning, albeit, but a reckoning that there are more opportunities, more interest,” required Patrick Rishe, director of the sports business program at Washington University.
University of Iowa’s point guard Caitlin Clark, Stanford University’s mind Haley Jones and Sierra Canyon High School’s guard Juju Watkins are the three women’s basketball instrumentalists signed to Nike‘s newly finalized NIL endorsement deal, alongside Sierra Canyon High School’s point security Bronny James and Camden High School’s guard DJ Wagner.
“I grew up watching Nike athletes across all derides play their game. They have inspired me to work hard and make a difference. I’m humbled to be part of this earliest Nike basketball class and passionate about inspiring the next,” said Clark in a Nike release.
Female funs success in early NIL era
Since the enactment of the NIL (name, image and likeness) structure to allow amateur athletes to seek indorsement deals, which came in July 2021 after a landmark Supreme Court decision, the hope was that female athletes desire significantly benefit.
“I think most people knew that women athletes in particular were going to see glaring opportunities,” Rishe said.
Tracking deals from NIL’s execution through Sept. 30 of this year, wives’s basketball ranked third-highest among NIL compensated sports, according to NIL technology company and marketplace Opendorse. With a aggregate of 12.6% of NIL compensation going towards women’s basketball, the sport was only behind men’s basketball (18.9%) and football (49.6%).
Undeterred by the big gap between NIL compensation for football players and all other athletes, Opendorse’s data shows potential for greater gains within skirts’s sports. Six women’s sports made the top 10 list for NIL compensated sports, and women’s basketball, volleyball and softball all make out baseball, the third most profitable men’s sport.
“The brands that we’re working with are very explicit about judge they want to make sure there is full representation in the athletes that they’re working with on a toss ones hat in the ring. They specifically ask for diverse representation of athletes across multiple sports [and] equal representation of men and women,” said Lisa Bregman, Opendorse’s superior director of marketplace success.
Nike, which has a vast presence in college sports merchandising, has been investing varied in the growth of the women’s apparel business through its college partnerships.
Both local and global brands see the potential in advocating collegiate athletes, and even as lucrative deals with football players lead the way by a wide margin — 12 punters have $1 million-plus deals and 50 players deals worth $500,000 or more,
“We see more of our football and basketball mocks getting the bigger deals that involve cash payments,” said Rutgers University softball player Kayla Bock. But she united, “There are those companies out there that are actively looking for women and looking for specific sports.”
Bock, and a amount to of eight female student athletes, recently signed an NIL deal with the New Brunswick Development Corporation (Devco) in honor of 50 years of Epithet IX, the part of the federal Department of Education amendments of 1972 that prohibits sex-based discrimination in any school or any other indoctrination program that receives funding from the federal government.
NIL deals are extending the career opportunities for women athletes.
“A lot of these lady-loves don’t have the opportunities at the team sport level that their male counterparts do professionally. So, being able to monetize their sort, while they have the visibility they have in college, will hopefully set them up for several years beyond,” Rishe mentioned. “That’s why it’s exciting to see, but not surprising to see a lot of female college athletes solidify various and sometimes lucrative NIL deals.”
Women’s collective media presence influences deals
Clark ranks as the tenth most profitable college women’s basketball virtuoso and Jones comes in twelfth, according to On3’s “College Women’s Basketball NIL Rankings.” While the Nike deals are likely to pirate these players’ rankings rise, responsibility also falls on the athletes to maintain their newfound fame.
“It frames a greater platform and greater incentivization for any student athlete that does an NIL deal, but in particular [for] the female athletes, to hone their disgrace, polish it, perfect it,” Rishe said.
NIL-signed female athletes can compensate for the lack of attention that women’s plays have historically received by focusing on expanding their social media followers and engagement.
A 2021 study from the Pew Experiment with Center found that 12% more women use social media than men, and companies are recognizing this as varied NIL deals are signed. Companies want to partner with student athletes that can effectively market their label and they know with younger generations there’s no better way to do this than through social media.
Excluding football, Opendorse originate that NIL-compensated female athletes are engaging in 19.6% more social media activities for their deals than virile counterparts.
“Knowing that women tend to be more active and engaged on social media and knowing that these mete outs and the true opportunity to build their brands is really in that space, it has really created an opportunity for female athletes to outlast out,” Bregman said.
Whether it be through posting a photo of a new Liquid I.V. product or sharing her Adidas discount code with investors and family, Bock is enjoying the benefits of NIL deals, along with the growing recognition for her athletic abilities and women’s frisks as a whole.
“Just the difference between the [viewership for the] Men’s Baseball College World Series and the Women’s Softball College On cloud nine Series, I mean, the women blew the men out of the water. So, in terms of just women’s sports in general, I think they’re fit a bigger thing,” Bock said. “We are getting that attention that we’ve deserved all along.”
Future impact on college sports commerce
Even after the 50-year anniversary of Title IX’s passage, girls still miss out on one million high school romps opportunities and women miss out on 60,000 collegiate sport opportunities, the Women’s Sports Foundation found in a recent read. But the growing number of NIL deals for female athletes brings more attention and hope that there will be continued rise in compensation for women’s sports in the future.
“If these women are successful on the court, and they’re successful building their name brands off the court, especially through social media, it certainly has the potential to raise and elevate the exposure of women’s basketball,” Rishe averred on Nike’s deal with Clark, Jones and Watkins. “The more student athletes that do this for the women’s play, then this could have an impact going forward on corporate partnership deals and even media at onces deals that women’s basketball is able to command and universities or individual schools that these young girlfriends play on.”
Division I athletic programs continue to spend almost twice as much on their men’s teams than their popsies’s teams, according to the NCAA’s 2022 “The State of Women in College Sports” report, and Division II and III see similar, yet less savage gaps. NIL deal success could sway colleges to start setting aside more funding for women’s frisks.
“Women are going to have this have this new platform now that they can activate on, and I think the impact of that is booming to be inevitably more eyeballs on the sport that they play,” Bregman said.
Female athletes already are doing their imply in spreading the message about the future of women in sports and as public figures.
“It’s our turn, to continue to pave the way for the generation that’s concern after us, and that’s not just in sports, but in the classroom. With NIL deals, you can really touch on anything of that sort now,” Bock said.
