By Aidan Joly
It’s an age-old tale in sports. Teams spend a lot of money to make themselves very good on paper, and sometimes it doesn’t translate to success on the court or field.
Now, with teams having great NIL situations and players getting million-plus dollar NIL deals, some teams in those situations are struggling.
The most notable ones here are at three programs: Indiana, Kansas State and Arkansas. The three are believed to all be in the top five in the country in NIL spending this past off-season, but the results are just not there. Combined, the teams are 5-11 in conference play. All had high expectations. Each have had several things go wrong.
Let’s start with Indiana. Things have become much more pronounced in the past two games as the Hoosiers took an 85-60 loss to Iowa on Saturday and followed it up with a 94-69 home loss against Illinois. Indiana failed to look competitive in either game as it fell to 4-3 in Big Ten play. It is seeing its NCAA tournament hopes slip away by the game.
Over the summer, Indiana brought in Oumar Ballo, Myles Rice and Kanaan Carlyle, all expected to be massive contributors to a lot of Hoosier wins. All got good NIL deals, with Ballo’s believed to be one of the best in the sport. Ballo has played well, but not to the extent the Hoosiers wanted. Rice has been about the same as he was at Washington State. Carlyle has taken a step back.
These struggles have thrust coach Mike Woodson squarely on the hot seat. There were plenty of rumors about a potential departure last spring, but athletic director Scott Dolson stuck with the alumni who dates back to the Bobby Knight days.
Look at what the football program did this season with the resources it had. A historically dreadful Indiana football went 11-2, was ranked in the top 10 in the country and made the College Football Playoff under first year coach Curt Cignetti. Look what can be done with resources!
Moving onto Kansas State. The Wildcats brought in what was a massive add in Coleman Hawkins for a deal believed to be in the $2 million range, making him the most expensive player in the sport.
What they have gotten from Hawkins is a step back as the Wildcats are 1-4 in Big 12 play and 7-9 overall and have eliminated themselves from the NCAA tournament conversation by this point in the season, if not did so a few weeks ago.
Coach Jerome Tang also brought in Michigan’s Dug McDaniel, Cal State Fullerton’s Max Jones, Kentucky’s Ugonna Onyenso and Samford’s Achor Achor. None have been what they wanted them to be. Achor was actually dismissed from the program on Dec. 11 after just seven games as a Wildcat.
Kansas State is another team believed to have one of the best NIL situations in the sport, but it has not shown. It is hard to believe that this is a program that was in the Elite Eight just two seasons ago in Tang’s first year at the helm.
The thing that is a little bit ironic that Tang likely could have had the Arkansas job last spring if he wanted it, which leads us to…
Arkansas. The Razorbacks made the biggest splash of the coaching carousel season by hiring future hall of famer John Calipari away from Kentucky after he spent well over a decade in Lexington.
The deal was rumored to have gotten done from donors who both paid Calipari handsomely as well as giving him what is believed to be the largest NIL budget in the country. With that budget he brought in an entirely new team, including multiple guys who played for him at Kentucky, former Florida Atlantic star Johnell Davis, and former Tennessee star Jonas Aidoo.
On paper, it looked like a seriously talented roster. What has it done?
The Razorbacks are 0-4 in SEC play, giving Calipari his first 0-4 start to SEC play in his career. This team is 2-6 against power conference teams, and one of those was against 4-13 Miami who just had a coaching change a few weeks ago.
Davis has perhaps been the most disappointing. Expected to be a major part of the team and blossom onto the power conference scene, he is not averaging double figures and only makes 41.3% of his shots after he made them at a 47.5% clip last season at FAU. Aidoo isn’t getting the minutes we expected him to get. Adou Thiero and Boogie Fland have both been good, but Arkansas needs more.
All in all, this is something that teams will need to grapple with when they look at their NIL budget and decide how they are going to use it. Because this season, the teams that spend the most certainly do not have the most success.
AJ Hoops 