The University of Maine athletic department just announced a new fundraising effort to support the direct payment of players at the school in Orono.
And the university has already raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for the effort, while roughly two dozen student-athletes are already getting some form of direct payment, according to the school’s athletic director.
UMaine Vice President and Athletic Director Jude Killy held a press conference in Orono on Monday to answer questions and share more details about the creation of the new Black Bear Student-Athlete Experience Fund. Killy had announced the fund’s inception in a Friday column in the Bangor Daily News.
Killy indicated that fundraising efforts had already been underway and have totaled in the hundreds of thousands of dollars so far. He stressed that the fundraising is still in progress.
“But we plan to be pretty aggressive on that pretty quickly, as well,” Killy said.
UMaine and other Division I institutions are now able to pay athletes directly after a historic settlement between the NCAA and a group of former and current collegiate athletes. While UMaine had opted into that settlement last summer, officials said they would not immediately start paying student athletes directly.
Now, that process has started. Killy shared more details Monday about a group of Black Bear student-athletes already receiving direct pay.
“We have about two dozen student-athletes that have deals right now, both men and women,” Killey said.
It’s unclear who those student-athletes are, or when exactly the direct payments started. Killy’s Friday column indicated those deals were signed “recently” in order to “stabilize our rosters and keep top talent in Maine.”
Killy said the baseline for that direct compensation is about $1,000 dollars, and is spread out over four or five sports. He said he would share more details at a later date.
“It’s an opportunity for us to create more opportunities,” Killy said about the movement to pay players directly in addition to their opportunities for Name, Image and Likeness deals that have already been available.
An overwhelming majority of Division I schools opted into the House vs. NCAA settlement last year, opening the door to allow student athletes across the country to get paid directly.
“It’s really just about arming ourselves as much as possible with as many weapons as possible,” Killy said.
He stressed that the new fund to support direct payments to student-athletes is based on outside funding, not from the department’s budget or university funding.
“These are private and philanthropic dollars,” Killy said. “We’re not using tuition, these aren’t state-funded dollars, and not taxpayer dollars.”
He also fielded a question about the change coming while UMaine is facing a budget shortfall and tuition hike.
“The reality is that we as a department also are in for cuts as well. We’re not immune to that, nor would I expect us to be,” Killy said. “But the other reality is, if we want to be a competitive Division I program, we do not have a choice. So we’re happy to take on the challenge of fundraising — getting private and philanthropic support to help us ensure that we have the ability to try and do that.”
Killy said that as the landscape in collegiate sports continues to evolve, UMaine athletics will need to evolve with it.
“The only thing that I can promise you right now is that we’re going to continue to have more change,” Killy said. “And the other thing I can promise you is that if we don’t continue to figure out ways to adapt, and to mold and modify, we will be left behind.”