With 36 varsity sports, how will Ohio State handle revenue sharing and NIL?

COLUMBUS, Ohio >> College athletic departments across the country have long been preparing for approval of the House v. NCAA settlement, which is ushering in a new revenue-sharing era of college sports. Few have more decisions to make than Ohio State, which boasts 36 Division I sports teams.

So what will the Buckeyes do when revenue sharing takes effect July 1 and $20.5 million can be shared with athletes?

Much of the department’s energy has gone to finding the correct model for an athletic department that has been firm in its commitment to keeping all of its varsity sports. The model, which athletic director Ross Bjork broke down with reporters Thursday, includes spending $18 million across four sports: football, men’s basketball, women’s basketball and women’s volleyball.

Though Bjork wouldn’t divulge how much each program is getting, he did say Ohio State chose those four sports based on its own metric-based system.

“The sports are popular, the Big Ten is a leader in volleyball and we want to get better,” Bjork said. “Coach (Jen) Flynn Oldenburg is working on a plan to get us back on track. With the attention we can receive, the Columbus market, volleyball is a booming sport and the Covelli Center is an amazing atmosphere.”

The other $2.5 million will be used to fund 91 new scholarships the department is adding for its 36 sports. According to the settlement, every new scholarship must count against the $20.5 million cap, with a maximum value of $2.5 million.

Bjork, who is nearing the one-year mark as Ohio State’s athletic director, is a fan of the newest change to college athletics.

“The main thing is clarity,” Bjork said. “Does it solve everything? Does it solve the employment piece? No, it doesn’t. Does it address Title IX and how that plays out? No, it doesn’t. So it’s not perfect, but it’s progress that we never had. It’s transformational progress.”

Ohio State’s plans don’t stop with the $20.5 million cap. On Tuesday, Ohio State announced the creation of the Buckeye Sports Group, a new name, image and likeness entity that takes the Buckeyes’ NIL efforts in-house. It will be run jointly by the athletic department and Learfield’s Ohio State Sports Properties to facilitate contracts and deals with athletes.

The days of NIL collectives like The Foundation and The 1870 Society working independently are gone, though they will serve in an advisory capacity to the new group.

While the settlement gives every athletic department in the country a set revenue-sharing cap, athletic departments can facilitate NIL deals with companies as long as the amount is based on a “fair market value.” Every third-party deal that exceeds $600 is subject to approval through a clearinghouse established by the College Sports Commission.

Ohio State should be well positioned to take advantage of the new rules, given its historical success, its status as the reigning national champion in football, its revenue as a premier program in the Big Ten and its large fan base, both locally and nationally. Bjork cited the fact that Columbus is the 14th largest city in the United States with 16 Fortune 1,000 companies and 50 companies that employ over 1,000 people. That’s a large base to begin with from an NIL perspective.

“Part of the analysis was how do we continue to capitalize on the brand and the city?” Bjork said. “The really cool thing is they may not have gone to school here, they lived in Ohio, went to school here, moved away, but they are Buckeye fans. Countless people I run into are in that category. It’s how do we reach those people? How do we do a statewide tour? Those are all things we’re mapping out.”

The job of the NIL entity will be to take the companies that are doing deals with Learfield and the Ohio State Properties already and match them with athletes, while also finding new companies to create partnerships with. The companies will pay the athletes, but the Buckeye Sports Group will help arrange the deal.

“We think we are in a really competitive spot, and if you layer in the third-party NIL environment, we are in a competitive spot,” Bjork said. “Now we have to orchestrate that, arrange that and make sure it meets fair market value. Ohio State football is a built-to-last championship brand. That’s not going away.”

In addition to funding 91 new scholarships across its varsity sports, Ohio State will also be able to help find NIL deals for the athletes in sports that may be overlooked. When Ohio State began thinking about its model, one of the first things it said was that it was not going to cut a sport.

“It’s the right thing to do based on legacy, history and an opportunity for those young people,” Bjork said.

This article originally appeared in The Athletic.

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