TULSA, Okla. — Amid the firing of football coach Kevin Wilson, football families at the University of Tulsa are looking for more answers surrounding NIL dealings.
NIL, or name, image and likeness money, is paid to student athletes across the NCAA for autograph signings, endorsements, appearances and more.
TU quarterback Cooper Legas and the family of TU linebacker Myles Jackson said they haven’t seen a dime of money.
“We are looking for a resolution,” Veronica Jackson, Myles’ mother said, “It’s a letdown now that the coach has been let go, no one can give us answers.”
Jackson says her son was promised tens of thousands of dollars in NIL money. However, she says, he never got anything in writing.
The Jackson family says they never got the money. Quarterback Cooper Legas tells the same story.
“Honestly, we’ve been scraping by with what my wife’s been making,” Legas said, “So I came here expecting to have, honestly, a decent amount of extra money and be able to save and be able to go home with a decent sum of money to start out the real world, but just been living off what my wife’s been making as a receptionist.”
According to NCAA rules, universities cannot directly involve themselves in NIL deals. Those are made with a so-called collective, usually made up of big-money alumni who facilitate the donations, and endorsement deals to pay the players.
“We’re just hoping that we can get a resolution to this,” Jackson said, “They’re just passing the ball. And I think it’s just trying to be thrown under the rug.”
In a statement to 2 News Oklahoma, TU said, the department of athletics is unaware of any promises of NIL payments made by the former head football coach to student-athletes completing their eligibility.
“Obviously Coach Wilson is gone so he can’t really help us out,” Legas said.
Coach Wilson texted 2 news saying: “We had no money – zero. We couldn’t give money we didn’t have.”
There is also so-called ‘Alston money.’
A few years ago, in the Alston case, the Supreme Court cleared the way to pay student athletes for academic achievements up to $8,000 annually.
Sources tell 2 News the school is making those payments regularly.
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