New Men’s College Basketball Event to Offer $2 Million in NIL Deals

Proposed Las Vegas event expected to host eight teams in 2024, expanding to 16 in 2025

A proposed non-conference basketball tournament seeks to expand Name, Image and Likeness money to a new level next season.

The tournament, slated to be held in Las Vegas in November, will offer up to $2 million in NIL deals to the players that participate. The tournament is expected to host eight teams in 2024 and expand to 16 teams in 2025.

Front Office Sports reported the tournament’s creation, which will be called Players Era. It is set to be played in the MGM Arena in Las Vegas. The event is likely to be held on Thanksgiving weekend.

EverWonder Studio and AND1 CEO Seth Berger will operate the event.

According to On3 sports, each team invited would get a $1 million guarantee in NIL money, which would be shared either with the school’s collective or NIL arm. The money would be shared with the players for that team.

The tournament’s winning team would get another $1 million in NIL funding.

This isn’t the first time this has been done. Last year’s College Basketball Invitational offered NIL payouts to players — but not on this level.

For that reason, some of the sport’s best teams may be extended an invitation. On3 reported that Alabama, Duke, Florida Atlantic, Houston, Kansas, Oregon, Rutgers, San Diego State, St. John’s, Syracuse and Virginia are all on the list of potential participants.

Right now teams are preparing for conference tournaments and March Madness. But some schools have already committed to non-conference tournaments, or multi-team events, for the 2024-25 season.

Teams are restricted to one MTE every season. Any team that has committed to an MTE already and is invited to this event would have to find a way to get out of that previous commitment.

That would be a small price to pay for this kind of a boost to a school’s NIL coffers.