A six-figure payday? Why UConn’s Paige Bueckers could cash in more than anyone from the NCAA’s new name, image and likeness rules

aAs Gov. Ned Lamont weighed last month whether to sign legislation to let college athletes in Connecticut sign endorsement deals, a surprising billboard appeared along I-84 in Bristol.

“America’s highest paid college athlete plays in Connecticut,” announced the sign, paid for by a Canadian-based company called Six Star Pro Nutrition. “We just can’t pay her yet.”

As any sports fan surely recognized, the billboard referred to Paige Bueckers, the UConn point guard whose unique mix of talent, moxie and social media popularity make her a national face of the seismic change coming to college sports. With the NCAA having declared — in response to legislation in Connecticut and about two dozen other states — that college athletes may profit off their names, images and likenesses, Bueckers could be ideally positioned to cash in.

“In terms of an athlete you could build a 360-degree universal integrated [marketing] campaign around, being the star player at the University of Connecticut’s women’s basketball program is a pretty nice position to be in,” said Jake Duhaime, consumer communications lead at Iovate Health Sciences, the parent company of Six Star Pro Nutrition. “And then you throw in the fact that those athletes are going to stay for four years and said athlete in question is just a sophomore, you could get really creative over the next three years with someone like that.”

Other brands likely agree. Industry analysts rank Bueckers among the college athletes with the largest earning potential, likely to fetch hundreds of thousands in annual endorsement income.

UConn’s name, image and likeness (or NIL) policy officially takes effect on July 12, after which Bueckers and other Huskies athletes can promote products, sign endorsement deals, profit off ad revenue on social media accounts and more.

For some athletes, that might mean a few hundred bucks to sign autographs at a local business or wear a certain mouth guard during football games. For Bueckers and other super-elite athletes like her, it will mean much, much more.

Six-figure earning potential

Bueckers, the reigning Naismith College Player of the Year, hasn’t said what kind of endorsement deals she might pursue or how aggressive she’ll be in maximizing NIL opportunities. But a windfall awaits her if she wants it.

As of Wednesday, the UConn sophomore had 829,000 followers on Instagram, plus 335,000 on TikTok and another 51,000 on Twitter, making her one of the most followed athletes, male or female, in American college sports. If she’s willing to pitch products on her social media accounts, that alone could net her tens of thousands of dollars.

An analysis conducted in March by Opendorse, a company that helps facilitate endorsement deals between athletes and brands, concluded that Bueckers’ following could be worth $382,000 annually, the most of any player in the Elite Eight of the men’s or women’s NCAA Tournament. Darren Rovell of Action Network recently ranked Bueckers sixth on a list of college athletes with the most to gain from NIL rights.

Jason Belzer, managing partner of Student Athlete NIL, another company that links brands with college athletes, said in June that Bueckers could likely charge thousands of dollars just for a sponsored Instagram post. Based on the typical endorsement income of professional athletes with similar social media followings, he projected she could make as much as $700,000 annually in endorsement income.

The NCAA’s new NIL rules, Belzer said, will most dramatically benefit two types of athlete: On one hand, superstar basketball and football players with national name recognition. On the other, charismatic social media influences who happen to play sports. As for athletes who check both boxes as Bueckers does?

“The ones who are really famous but also do really well from being a social influencer are going to be the ones that make bank,” Belzer said.

In fact, it’s possible Bueckers will never be more marketable than she is currently, with a rabid fanbase in a college hoops-obsessed state behind her.

“College is the time when you’re going to have a really passionate fanbase and you’re going to be growing your fanbase,” said Sydney Large, a former college athlete-turned social media manager at Opendorse. “This NIL era is the time to capitalize.”

Female athletes set to cash in

Those in the burgeoning NIL industry say the new landscape could particularly benefit female athletes, who are often more active on social media than their male counterparts.

“Women are going to make more then men just by the sheer fact they have larger social media followings on average,” Belzer said.

UConn’s women’s basketball team is a prime example. There is Bueckers and her nearly 900,000 Instagram followers, but there’s also freshman Azzi Fudd with 159,000 followers, senior Olivia Nelson-Ododa with 76,000 followers and at least six other Huskies with at least 12,000 followers.

UConn’s men’s basketball team has only one player, sophomore Andre Jackson, with that many Instagram followers.

Some of this difference reflects broad cultural trends, but Large says it may also reflect how female athletes are forced to advocate for themselves from a young age.

“They’ve had to naturally market themselves for years now,” she said. “They’re marketing themselves to have people come to a game and to draw attention to their sport.”

On Instagram, Bueckers posts not only basketball photos but also new haircuts, fresh outfits and pleas for racial justice. On her TikTok feed, she mostly shares clips of herself lip-syncing and dancing along with hip-hop songs. If not for various UConn apparel, you might not even know she played basketball.

This tracks with something Large has observed on social media: Women tend to post a wider variety of content, attracting a wider variety of followers.

“A lot of [female athletes] have built really natural communities. It doesn’t seem forced and it doesn’t seem super fan-oriented,” Large said. “If you look a D-1 football star, you’re going to see a lot of the average football fan. But if you go to a female athlete’s profile, it’s a really broad range of people who are interested in different things.”

Bueckers, Fudd and their UConn teammates aren’t the only female athletes positioned for lucrative endorsement deals. LSU gymnast Olivia Dunne has more than a million followers on Instagram and nearly 4 million on TikTok. Fresno State basketball twins Haley and Hanna Cavinder are viral TikTok stars as well. Louisville basketball player Hailey Van Lith also has a massive following..

According to Opendorse, eight of the 10 players in the Elite Eight of last year’s NCAA basketball tournaments with the largest social media followings were women.

“Next year, when the 50th anniversary of Title IX officially hits in June of 2022, it’s very likely that the highest paid college athlete is going to be a woman,” Duhaime said. “And that is a landmark, glass ceiling-breaking milestone.”

At a media availability Tuesday, Bueckers mostly downplayed her impending NIL windfall.

“I don’t ever want my priorities to get messed up. I want to continue to put basketball first,” she said. “I want people to help me when I get sort of distracted and pulled back by all the noise and people who want me to do this and do that. It’s about me being me and not letting anything change that.”

Still, the sophomore was clear that focusing on basketball doesn’t mean foregoing the big payout newly available to her. Bueckers said she will surround herself “with a great team — financial advisor, probably an agent” to help her manage NIL opportunities.

“People who will help me with all this stuff, because I don’t really know anything about it,” she said. “I’ve got to research more.”

Courant staff writer Alexa Philippou contributed to this report.

Alex Putterman can be reached at aputterman@courant.com.