Unrivaled is expanding its reach to include women’s college basketball players. Among them are stars like Azzi Fudd, Lauren Betts, and Hannah Hidalgo. Other 13 women’s college hoops players have signed NIL deals with the league.
The 3×3 league was founded by WNBA stars Napheesa Collier and Breanna Stewart as a way to allow professional players to keep in competitive shape during the offseason, without having to leave the United States.
In a recent interview in “A Touch More with Sue Bird & Megan Rapinoe”, Collier spoke about the new NIL deals and why she and Stewart decided to bring in college players into the fold:
“Really bridging the gap. So, that was like one of the things internally that we wanted to make kind of one of our pillars for why we created Unrivaled. There’s such a gap between like the college player and the professional player, which you don’t see that in the NBA a lot. You see them promoting them on their pages. They have like training camps and all these things like bridges between next steps. High school, college, professional. And we wanted to make that too.” (41:14)
According to Collier, the goal at Unrivaled is to make the college basketball players household names before they arrive in the WNBA. It seems that they’re trying to pick up where the WNBA has failed to lead.
Some would argue that the NCAA is doing a fine job on its own. During their time in college, players like Caitlin Clark, Cameron Brink, Angel Reese, and Paige Bueckers were more famous nationwide than the leading WNBA players at the time.
Unrivaled’s president on decision to invest significant money in NIL deals
Unrivaled announced its decision to invest money in the college side of the game earlier in July. At the time, Luke Cooper, the company’s president of basketball operations, said the following about the move in a press release.
“Investing in elite women’s basketball talent is central to Unrivaled’s mission,” Luke Cooper said. “This transformational, first-of-its-kind initiative brings together the best of the best and reflects our deep commitment to elevating the women’s game and holistically supporting athletes.”
UCLA is the best-represented school on the list, with three players: Lauren Betts, Sienna Betts, and Kiki Rice. The second place is a tie between UConn and Notre Dame, with two players each.
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