The landscape of college basketball is changing, and Steve Waterfield, the Director of Athletics at Oakland University, is looking to stay ahead of the curve.
In 2022, the Name, Image and Likeness Rule (NIL), went into effect. This rule allowed NCAA student-athletes to profit off of their name and brand. Schools can directly pay students through collectives, but students most often exercise the rule once they have arrived at a post-secondary school.
For Oakland, the school is navigating how to use NIL, with the university being a mid-major and Horizon League member. Since the school does not have a comparable budget to blue blood programs, attracting talent must come in other forms.
“Obviously, the recruiting inducement thing is tough, that’s essentially allowing schools to do what they couldn’t do before on the recruiting side,” Waterfield said. “Once the student-athletes get here it’s fine. I think the going rate for a Power 5 quarterback is 1-2 million dollars.”
Outside of not having a football program, that figure is not within the means of the university.
“The values we’ve seen in the Horizon League, we’re not talking five figures most of the time, it is more times three figures, sometimes two figures,” Waterfield said.
Despite this, the Horizon League has made diligent efforts to afford its student-athletes ample NIL opportunities. In August 2022, the conference launched a first-of-its-kind NIL marketplace.
Waterfield sees the transfer portal as the premiere way to build talented rosters.
“That was great publicity for the Horizon League [Milwaukee’s signing of 247Sports no. 8 prospect Patrick Baldwin Jr.], but he didn’t play many games,” Waterfield said. “Where we see the opportunity, Jamal Cain is a good example. Goes to Marquette, doesn’t play, and is from the Pontiac area. He comes here, and I think he will tell you, his year here [at Oakland], got him to the NBA.”
Waterfield would go on to say how such a story is also beneficial for the school, as opposed to collecting premiere high school talent.
“I think that’s really how, with the transfer world, if you get a really good high school prospect, there’s probably a good chance they’re gone in one year,” Waterfield said. “So you’ve got to look at 1-, 2-, grad-transfers [like Cain] as your bread and butter.”
This is a philosophy that the programs Waterfield oversees have practiced. Rocket Watts, a heralded point guard prospect, struggled to find his niche at Michigan State and Mississippi State. Now, back home in Metro Detroit, Watts has found comfort in being a steady guard in the Golden Grizzlies’ rotation.
The same can be said for Jack Gohlke, the 24-year-old, fifth-year senior who is playing his first season with the Golden Grizzlies after transferring from Hillsdale College. Gohlke has formed into a formidable movement shooter for Oakland, shooting at a 33% clip from three.
With NIL and the emerging transfer portal, team construction still has its nuances, and is sometimes a game of luck and connections.
“If you have a coach with a son or daughter who is really good, that sometimes helps too,” Waterfield said with a laugh.
