Guest Post: Here's a clue on how more mid-majors are approaching House, NIL and sponsorships

Good morning, and thanks for your continued support of Extra Points.

Quick housekeeping note up top. I am flying out first thing Saturday morning for Hawaii, where I will be until Thursday. I’m then flying to Fresno for a few days, and will return to Extra Points HQ on Nov 3. This is a trip for Serious Professional Journalism reasons (okay fine, it’s also kinda a working vacation too), so expect multiple newsletters on Hawaii next week.

But if I am a little slow responding to your email or text message next week, it isn’t because I don’t love you. It’s because I’m busy doing Journalism. Or eating a pineapple by a waterfall. One of those two things.

Today, I’m happy to pass the microphone over to Friend of the Newsletter Bill Farley, a fellow FOIA-enthusiast who runs his own excellent Substack on conference realignment.

Farley reached out to me about an Idaho State Board of Education meeting that happened on Tuesday. The meeting was regularly scheduled, and included updates on things like Lewis-Clark State College governance, generative AI in the classroom, K12 education, and other things that, while interesting, are generally outside the purview of Extra Points.

But the meeting also included an update on the House settlement and various NIL related policy matters, and the ADs from Idaho State, the University of Idaho, and Boise State all spoke. Their comments shed some light on who might opt in to the House settlement, how mid-major schools are looking to pay for everything, potential changes to Buy Game contracts, and more.

I’ll let Bill share what he learned from the meeting:

D1 Universities in the Gem State preview how they will address the House Settlement

Idaho’s State Board of Education met last Thursday at Lewis and State College in Lewiston to hear how their universities planned to address the House Settlement. It is one of the few public forums to date discussing the topic. 

The Idaho State Board oversees three Division 1 athletic programs: the University of Idaho and Idaho State in the FCS, and Boise State in the FBS.  The fiscal year 2024 athletic department budgets for these universities were $59.9 million for Boise State, $24.1 million for the University of Idaho, and $17.2 million for Idaho State. [Note: These numbers, along with AD and coach contracts, can be found via the Extra Points Library]

Representing those schools were athletic directors Jeramiah Dickey (Boise State), Terry Gawlick (University of Idaho), and Pauline Thiros (Idaho State). The discussion was wide-ranging but focused on both challenges and opportunities with NIL.

Thiros, operating with the smallest operating budget of the three programs, started her presentation by briefly pointing out the uneven allocation of NIL backpay proposed by the NCAA. Idaho State’s backpay obligation is $2.5 million spread over ten years. And, while that will only take about 1.5% of her annual budget, she expressed frustration that the Power 4 schools that created the problem are paying a quarter of her assessment on a percentage basis.

Thiros expressed hope that pressure could be brought to bear on the NCAA to make the Power 4 schools take a greater share of the backpay settlement. Thiros then moved on to strategies to address NIL costs, the benefits of the House Settlement, and why she was seriously considering opting in to the settlement and providing revenue sharing for her student-athletes. 

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