College coaches see a game shifting beneath piles of NIL cash as March Madness arrives

Fox Sports

01-04-2025

Associated Press
More than the deep runs in March Madness, the 660 victories over 37 years or even the 20 or so players he coached who ended up making millions in the NBA, Leonard Hamilton is proud of a number he can count on one hand.
It is, he says, the number of players he coached at Miami, and then for the past 23 seasons at Florida State, who failed to graduate.
Hamilton, now 76 and stepping away from a business he barely recognizes anymore, says he is at peace with leaving coaching behind. More than a dozen other coaches interviewed by The Associated Press leading up to this year's NCAA tournaments expressed concern about the future of their industry. Most said they still liked their jobs, but it has taken some adjustments.
'What I have learned is, the skill set that was required to be a good coach 10 years ago, very little of that applies anymore,' said Buzz Williams, who just completed his sixth season at Texas A&M.
Coach after coach, from Miami's Jim Larrañaga to Virginia's Tony Bennett to Villanova's Jay Wright and others have all walked away from the game, saying it no longer holds the appeal it once did. Some blamed the transfer portal for the added stress — Michigan State coach Tom Izzo last week called the portal a 'urinal' — and of course the pressure to compete for players with endorsement money, a topic that stretches beyond basketball.
Most of those coaches made comfortable careers in college, some of them earning big paychecks, and some of their replacements are doing just fine. But there is no way around the fact that many feel their profession is becoming difficult to manage in its current state and certainly doesn't have the same feel-good goals it once did.
Answers? Williams doesn't have them, other than 'this upcoming season is going to be different from the last season.' Hamilton insists he doesn't have answers either for a college sports landscape that feels more like a talent auction every day. Only questions.
One of them: 'Have you heard anybody talk about academics lately?'
These days, big bucks are available in college. The numbers attached to name, image and likeness deals are now what get the most attention. They are the most telling indicator of a program's health and the main consideration – maybe the only consideration – when it comes to adding players from an increasingly packed transfer portal or simply keeping them on your own roster.
UCLA coach Cori Close, who is taking the program to its first women's Final Four, says the Bruins have all the advantages they need to stay competitive.
'That being said, globally, I do wonder if we are eroding the true lessons that stay with young people for the rest of their lives," Close said. "My biggest commitment in being a coach is preparing young people for life after basketball and I sometimes worry ... we're eroding some of the character building that I think is really what's most special about college athletics.' Life as a coach means change
As leader of one of the wealthiest athletic departments in the country, Michigan athletic director Warde Manuel has things relatively good.
Last year, when the Wolverines were coach shopping, they made a run at Florida Atlantic coach Dusty May — he was fresh off his team's magical run to the Final Four — and had the resources to land him. One of May's top players at FAU, Vlad Goldin, and one of his top recruits, LJ Cason, came with him.
That sort of churn, from the smaller school to the bigger one, is now a daily occurrence in college basketball.
At Northern Colorado, Steve Smiley came oh-so-close to the program's second March Madness appearance last month. The Bears, playing in the Big Sky Conference, are a solid program that occasionally nabs a great player.
Two seasons ago, that player was Dalton Knecht, who blossomed and averaged 20 points and seven rebounds. A year later, he was making bigger money at Tennessee on his way to the NBA. Last year, the diamond in the rough was Saint Thomas, who came to Northern Colorado from Loyola-Chicago. This season, he played for Southern California.
'I still enjoy coaching every bit as much as I ever have,' Smiley said. 'But I'm from the small colleges, I played Division II basketball, I coached at junior college and a lot of different levels before getting to this one. You wear a million different hats, and you grow with that idea, and it's helped us be able to adjust to all the movement and change.' What are the rules and who enforces them?
Even if schools are freed up to spend $20.5 million on players under terms of the pending NCAA-House settlement, that money will be distributed later this year in different ways to players in different sports – mostly football and men's and women's basketball.
The payments will come from the schools -- above the table -- but the general lack of transparency in college sports put a disconcerting spin on Hamilton's departure from Florida State. Late last year, six players sued the coach, claiming he did not make good on promises to pay them NIL money in a dispute seen elsewhere this past season.
The school has denied wrongdoing. Hamilton doesn't talk about the lawsuit. He is more comfortable asking questions about the world that created it.
'You can't be the president of Chrysler today and the president of Ford tomorrow. You can't play for the Lakers on Monday, then go play for the Clippers on Friday,' Hamilton said. 'And somebody needs to be accountable for the chaos and explain what the thought process is of how we're supposed to deal with all this. There has to be a structure. That's how you keep order in society.'
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AP Sports Writers Pat Graham, Michael Marot, Teresa Walker, Eric Olson, Larry Lage and Steve Megargee contributed to this report.
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AP March Madness bracket: https://apnews.com/hub/ncaa-mens-bracket and coverage: https://apnews.com/hub/march-madness. Get poll alerts and updates on the AP Top 25 throughout the season. Sign up here.
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