UNC, NC State, Duke, ECU football coaches join call for federal NIL legislation

By Brian Murphy, WRAL

Cary, N.C. — Calls for national regulation around college athletes’ name, image and likeness are growing louder among college administrators and coaches.

And the football coaches at Duke, East Carolina, NC State and North Carolina are no different, using their high-profile positions Friday to urge federal lawmakers to provide clarity on rules and standards among schools when it comes to how collegiate athletes profit from their names, image and likeness. It is the third academic year that athletes can use their NIL rights.

"We need a standard," UNC coach and College Football Hall of Fame member Mack Brown said at Friday's 20th annual Pigskin Preview in Cary. The event was hosted by the Bill Dooley chapter of the National Football Foundation and included head coaches from the four schools.

Without one, Brown argued, a dozen programs that have the most money will acquire the best players and take all the spots in the coming 12-team playoff to the exclusion of everyone else.

"But if we get it, where it's a national standard and some equality across our game again, I think it'll be really good and probably be the best situation for kids we've ever had," said Brown, entering his fifth year in his second UNC tenure.

The push for national regulations or guardrails is not new. ACC commissioner Jim Phillips called for Congress to act during remarks at the ACC Football Kickoff event in July 2022.

But those efforts have ramped up during a summer of intense lobbying from NCAA officials on down, who see federal legislation as perhaps the only solution to a name, image and likeness issue of its own making. The SEC sent a contingent of coaches, including Alabama's Nick Saban, to Washington this summer to meet with lawmakers.

After years of fighting against allowing college athletes to profit off their name, image and likeness (NIL), the NCAA abruptly ceded the point, beginning July 1, 2021, with few guidelines.

Some states have passed increasingly lenient NIL laws, a few even shutting out NCAA enforcement or investigation of athletes in their state. North Carolina does not have an NIL specific law. Instead, the schools are operating under a three-page executive order issued by Gov. Roy Cooper on July 2, 2021.

And so the recourse has been to beg Congress for a national solution. NCAA president Charlie Baker, the former governor of Massachusetts, was hired in large part for his ability to navigate the political process.

"A level playing field is what we all want,” said NC State coach Dave Doeren, who is entering his 11th season with the Wolfpack. “And we want, somehow, there to be federal legislation that allows us the opportunity to have oversight in this space. That's what's really challenging. Fifty states have 50 laws. The NCAA doesn't have the power to do anything about that. We're all just trying to figure out how to win and stay in the lines."

A 'combustible environment'

A slow-moving and divided Congress — Republicans hold a slim majority in the House, while Democrats have a 51-49 edge in the Senate — may actually be moving on the issue. Several proposals have been floated in recent weeks, including an effort from three senators that would preempt state laws, set national regulations and create a body to oversee enforcement.

The ACC, SEC, Big Ten, Big 12 and Pac-12 — the highest-revenue football-playing conferences in the NCAA with the most revenue — issued a statement applauding several U.S. senators for their work on potential legislation.

"Given the ever-changing landscape of college athletics, developing a federal standard that will preserve college athletics and serve as a uniform name, image, and likeness standard for athletes and institutions across the country is now essential," the conferences said. "We are pleased to see that momentum continues building in both the Senate and the House to address the issue. Our conferences welcome additional efforts in the future."

No legislation is imminent, leaving coaches, who prize control, with precious little of it over the process. Duke's football coach, Mike Elko, called it "a really dangerous environment right now," citing the combination of the changing NIL rules with significant changes to the NCAA's transfer rules.

"You created a very combustible environment," said Elko, who is entering his second season at Duke after winning ACC Coach of the Year honors in 2022.

Elko, like his coaching colleagues, isn’t seeking a rollback of NIL. It is now accepted among the majority of coaches that athletes deserved “a little bit more piece of the pie than what they were getting,” as Elko put it.

"There's a lot of college coaches just asking for help, just to regulate,” he said. "I don't think anybody really wants to see it go away. I think we want the student-athletes to be able to get what they deserve and to be able to make and earn. But we need some regulation and we need rules and oversight.

"And we also need somebody to protect the student-athletes. To tell a kid, I'm going to give you 'A' and have no binding desire to have to actually do that, it's just bad business for college athletics."

East Carolina turns school in

Name, image and likeness deals are not allowed to be used as a recruiting inducement for high school athletes or transfers. But no one denies that it is happening, and college coaches are particularly disturbed by what they've termed "tampering" with players on their roster, trying to get them to jump into the transfer portal.

East Carolina coach Mike Houston said he reported a school to the NCAA for tampering this off-season. He declined to say which school, but said it is not in the region. He said it was not a third party, but rather "members of that program." Houston said he has not heard from the NCAA.

"We heard it was going on,” he said. “We called the institution and told them, 'Listen, this is what's going on. You need to nip it in the bud.' It continued on and so that's when we turned them in. You got a kid on your roster that's happy. He's where he wants to be. He's thriving, and you get people in your ears starting to mess with him. They start talking about money and that's the stuff I don't like.

"If the kid's in a bad situation and he feels like some place is better for him, I support that. But just messing with kids that are thriving in the environment they're in, that's where the back channel stuff has got to stop."

Roster management has become a year-round responsibility.

"I don't even know what you define as tampering, so we have 365-days-a-year free agency," Elko said.

The coaches said they are concerned, too, about what fundraising needs associated with NIL are doing to their donor base.

Two NC State collectives raised nearly $700,000 during a joint event this week that featured former NC State quarterback Philip Rivers and country music singer Scotty McCreery, a former NC State student. Doeren appeared at the event, hosted by the Pack of Wolves NIL Collective and Savage Wolves.

"I've never had to be involved in fundraising the way I am now," Doeren said.

Brown joked that some donors have his number on their phone and are tempted to hang up when he calls knowing he is asking for money.

"Congress, the states, everybody, the commissioners, everybody's gotta get on the same page here and start saying what is best for college football," Brown said. "You've got this balance of what's best for college football and what's best for the kids and really the fans because right now it's not sustainable.

"We're asking fans for NIL money, we're asking fans for facility money, for coaches' money. We're asking them for season-ticket money and parking money. It's just ridiculous."

The money is rolling in at some places. ACC power Clemson reported $135 million in donations in fiscal year 2023, shattering its previous record of $76.3 million set in fiscal year 2021.

The ACC lags behind the SEC and Big Ten in media-rights revenue, a source of considerable angst for the ACC. The American Conference, East Carolina's home, is even further down the revenue chain.

"‘What do you want me to give to?’ That's what we're getting from alumni," Houston said. "And that's what we're all getting from alumni. But I do know this: You're only as good as your players. And so if you don't have great players, none of that other stuff's going to matter."