St. Thomas and Gophers navigate the men’s basketball transfer portal with NIL and revenue sharing in mind

Coming off his program’s best season at the Division I level, St. Thomas men’s basketball coach Johnny Tauer didn’t anticipate losing his top two scorers once the transfer portal opened last month.

The 24-win Tommies were runner-up in the Summit League regular season and conference tournament. They are NCAA tournament eligible for the first time next year — and will be debuting a new arena.

Still, Tauer’s starting junior guards Miles Barnstable and Kendall Blue decided to transfer to chase bigger paydays with name, image and likeness (NIL) and upcoming revenue sharing for athletes.

Blue, a former East Ridge standout, signed with Nebraska. A former Division III standout, Barnstable signed with Tulsa. They were among several top Summit League players to transfer so far this spring.

“You see players moving around an awful lot,” Tauer said. “It’s easy to judge them, but the reality is it’s within the ground rules. And every kid and their family has the opportunity to decide what’s best for them. But there are a lot of people on the periphery that probably push kids a little too much that the grass is greener. That’s the saddest part.”

No team can avoid being hit by portal losses in today’s landscape. St. Thomas and the Gophers are in the same boat with other D-I programs trying to rebuild rosters this spring, but they have a different approach to recruiting with NIL and soon-to-be revenue sharing.

“For certain kids getting more money immediately is the right thing to do,” Tauer said. “For other kids, immediate money might not be the most important thing. It’s more about the holistic experience.”

New Gophers coach Niko Medved is excited about taking over at the right time with greater investment in the program. Financially, he’s able to offer more to players than ever because of revenue sharing. The pending NCAA vs. House settlement will allow schools to pay their athletes up to $20.5 million annually, mostly in football and men’s basketball.

But Medved is also facing his biggest rebuild. He will return only two players with freshmen Isaac Asuma and Grayson Grove. The Gophers will need twice as many newcomers than the five they have signed, including four transfers.

“Maybe when we first got to Colorado State there was some of that,” Medved said. “But now you’re in this world where every year you’re looking at five or six [new] guys or more. Hopefully we start to move past that as we kind of get more clarity with what it’s going to look like from a rev share and NIL perspective moving forward. Ultimately, if you’re going to be really good, you’ve got to retain your best guys.”

Medved’s predecessor Ben Johnson didn’t have the resources to keep starters such as Elijah Hawkins and Pharrel Payne, who went on to play on NCAA tournament teams at Texas Tech and Texas A&M, respectively. Payne recently followed coach Buzz Williams to Maryland for a figure rumored to be well over $1 million.

The Gophers still probably couldn’t afford to bring Payne back if they tried. And Medved’s former Colorado State point guard Kyan Evans committed to North Carolina on Wednesday for possibly seven figures as well.

Losing out on players to programs with deep-pocketed boosters can still happen to the Gophers in the new climate, but they are more equipped to compete in a bidding war with teams on their level, according to their NIL collective.

“I’m optimistic about the near future of Gophers men’s basketball,” Dinkytown Athletes co-founder Derek Burns said. “With revenue sharing and us doing better in NIL than any previous year, when you combine those two things the disparity between resources is shrinking.”

The Gophers’ collective raised more money in a few weeks — in the millions of dollars — after Medved’s hiring than it had all of last year.

“Niko and his staff have been incredibly active in fundraising since the moment they arrived,” Burns said. “There hasn’t been one day when they haven’t engaged in some fundraising activity. That’s absolutely encouraging. But more than that, they’re willing to embrace the reality of college sports right now.”

The Tommies never had the same recruiting budget as Big Ten programs like the Gophers. That won’t change with St. Thomas likely prioritizing men’s basketball over football when revenue sharing kicks in. But the Tommies are striving to stay competitive in NIL and rev share with other mid-majors.

Tauer received a commitment from Furman transfer and former Totino-Grace standout Tommy Humphries on Friday.

“I think the university is starting to demonstrate that basketball and hockey are two primary areas they want to focus in on that can help us with our national exposure,” said Tauer’s former St. Thomas teammate Brent Longval, who started the school’s first basketball collective.

Last February, Longval founded Elevate the Arches to create more NIL opportunities for Tommies hoops. He also leans on alumni to provide internships for new recruits to help with networking and career planning outside of basketball.

“Someone is not going to come to St. Thomas for the money,” Longval said. “We’re going to be able to provide some financial incentive through the collective. You’re not going to get rich here in the four years. But we believe you’ve got the capability to connect with the alumni base that has done extraordinarily well.”

After the 2022-23 season, the Tommies lost their leading scorer and Summit League freshman of the year Andrew Rohde to Virginia for more NIL money. And Rohde transferred again to Wisconsin this spring for just that.

But two years later, Tauer was proud to post on social media this week about having the No. 1 most offensively efficient team in college basketball — even ahead of national power Duke.

That will help St. Thomas sell itself the more traditional way with playing style, playing time, culture and fit.

Surprisingly, it’s still not primarily about NIL and revenue sharing in recruiting for some programs.

“Money is something people talk about because it’s tangible and easy to compare,” Tauer said. “If one school is offering me X and the other is offering me 2X, then that seems easy to decide. But when you start talking about all the other stuff. That’s harder to quantify.”