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It’s well-known how deep the private equity industry has been pushing into professional sports — from the NFL and NBA to the rocketship that is pro women’s sports. Always hungry for the next area that can generate strong financial returns, PE players have naturally turned their attention to another realm: high school sports.
The latest PE push into high school and other youth sports came with a deal announced Wednesday, under which KKR-backed PlayOn will pick up high school sports information provider MaxPreps.
The deal, which sees Paramount’s CBS Sports selling MaxPreps to PlayOn, will “transform the high school fan experience,” according to a statement. Together with PlayOn’s other high school sports-focused brands—GoFan and the NFHS Network—the transaction will form a single online platform that offers ticketing and live streaming capabilities and provides scores, data, rosters, highlights and more, allowing fans to keep tabs on their favorite high school teams and student-athletes.
MaxPreps features information about 29 different sports, from basketball, baseball, soccer and football to badminton, fencing, gymnastics and archery. The platform covers roughly 28,900 high schools across all 50 U.S. states, according to B.J. Pilling, president of PlayOn.
“We wanted to amplify the experience for high school sports fans,” Pilling tells Front Office Sports. “That’s hard to do without the iconic brand that is MaxPreps.”
Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed. A representative for Paramount declined to comment, and a representative for KKR did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The deal comes a few years after KKR made a “significant investment” in PlayOn back in 2022, joining the company’s existing private investor Panoramic Ventures, according to a statement from the time. The process of buying MaxPreps took nearly a year to “finally get over the finish line,” says Pilling, and PlayOn had to outlast competitors who also had interest in acquiring the business.
“Any deal has its bumps and turns,” he says. “CBS Sports was great in the process, there was mutual agreement that this is the right home for MaxPreps.”
The deal underscores a recent youth sports boom in the private equity world. KKR is also invested in youth sports management platform LeagueApps, for example. Last year, meanwhile, PE veterans Josh Harris and David Blitzer formed Unrivaled Sports, a parent organization to house numerous youth sports assets, such as Ripken Baseball and Cooperstown All Star Village. Other examples from last year include a $100 million investment into League One Volleyball, which owns junior volleyball squads across the U.S., in a funding round led by Atwater Capital, as well as a $25 million capital injection from Five Elms Capital into 360Player, which offers a sports management software for youth sports teams.
The push into youth sports could be cause for concern for some, as there is a public perception that PE firms are so focused on financial gains that they fail to provide the appropriate support to keep portfolio companies running strong.
While Pilling says he can’t speak to the broader public concern about PE getting into youth sports, or the general idea that PE players can leave portfolio companies overleveraged once they exit, he can speak to his specific experience with KKR.
“They’ve been nothing but professional and first class,” he says. “They’ve been able to provide great connections and value, and really helped us get to the point we’re at today where we have the opportunity to build something great.”
