INDIANAPOLIS — Women’s basketball is the center of the sports world this weekend thanks to the WNBA All-Star Game, but Unrivaled took the opportunity to break news of its own.
The 3-on-3 women’s basketball league announced Saturday it has signed 14 NCAA women’s college basketball players to NIL deals. The players are: UCLA’s Lauren Betts, Sienna Betts, and Kiki Rice; Texas’s Madison Booker; Iowa State’s Audi Crooks; UConn’s Azzi Fudd and Sarah Strong; LSU’s MiLaysia Fulwiley; Notre Dame’s Hannah Hidalgo; LSU’s Flau’jae Johnson; South Carolina’s Ta’Niya Latson; TCU’s Olivia Miles; Michigan’s Syla Swords; and USC’s JuJu Watkins.
Watkins and Johnson both already had an affiliation with Unrivaled. Watkins was a part of the league’s $28 million investment round announced in December, while Johnson followed Paige Bueckers as the second college player to sign an NIL deal with the league.
The 14 players will participate in a multi-day summit called The Future is Unrivaled, where they will have basketball development sessions and also shoot content for the league. The summit will take place from July 31 to August 2.
The league originally aimed to have 10 new players on NIL deals, but all 14 accepted offers. “Everyone we asked said yes,” Unrivaled president of basketball operations Luke Cooper said.
Johnson’s and Bueckers’s deals included equity in the league, but this new round of deals does not have the same perk. It also does not guarantee the college players will get a spot in Unrivaled when they turn pro.
The deals run through the end of the 2025–26 women’s college basketball season.
Unrivaled co-founder Alex Bazzell said Thursday the league expects to add six additional players to the talent pool next season. However, the league will not add to its 36 roster spots. The additional players in Miami will likely help fill in for injured players.
The league also plans to add two expansion teams in 2027.
The announcements came at Unrivaled’s pop-up less than a mile from Gainbridge Fieldhouse, the site of the WNBA All-Star Game. The news also comes just two days after the first in-person CBA meeting between the WNBA and the Women’s National Basketball Players Association (WNBPA).
Unrivaled co-founders and WNBA All-Stars Breanna Stewart and Napheesa Collier were both present at the meeting and are both board members of the union. Stewart said Friday that the meeting was “a wasted opportunity” and believed no progress was made.
The two have been criticized for having a conflict of interest in the CBA negotiations. Their fellow Unrivaled co-founder Bazzell, who is Collier’s husband, told the media Thursday that there is no conflict of interest.
“I’m hopeful they come to a CBA agreement,” Bazzell said in response to a question from Front Office Sports.
