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UConn star Paige Bueckers has signed a name, image, and likeness deal with Unrivaled that will give her equity in the new 3-on-3 women’s basketball league, a first for a current college athlete.
The Athletic first reported the news.
WNBA stars and current Olympians Breanna Stewart and Napheesa Collier announced their new league last summer. They plan to give all first-year players six-figure salaries and equity ownership in the league.
Unrivaled will debut in January and run through March. The league has slowly unveiled its first crop of players throughout the summer, including Kelsey Plum, Jackie Young, Arike Ogunbowale, Chelsea Gray, and Jewell Loyd. It will feature a compressed full-court and have 30 players spread across six teams.
Bueckers won’t play in the first season of the new league, but will join after her college career ends. Like the other announced players, Bueckers’s participation in Unrivaled will be in addition to her play in the WNBA.
According to WNBA reporter Khristina Williams, Bueckers won’t be the only college athlete Unrivaled targets. Several others are expected to sign NIL deals with the league later this year, Williams reported.
With what are slated to be the highest average payouts of any women’s sports league, Unrivaled could reinforce the WNBA’s relatively small salaries for this group of players. The new media-rights deal and likely new CBA begin in 2026—the combination of which could bring the league’s first million-dollar salaries—but for now, many WNBA players play overseas to supplement their income. But Unrivaled, similar to Athletes Unlimited, offers an offseason alternative on U.S. soil. The league will be based in Miami, but the founders want to bring games to other cities during the regular season.
It’s noteworthy Bueckers signed and committed to the deal now, considering she won’t play for Unrivaled until January 2026. But given that Stewart and Collier both won national championships at UConn, including one together, Bueckers seems like a no-brainer.
While plenty of NIL deals involve an ownership stake in a company, equity in a league itself will be a first for a college athlete. But Bueckers joins another recent women’s college basketball star in sports ownership. Shortly after her WNBA career began, Angel Reese, who is younger than Bueckers, joined the ownership group of DC Power Football Club of the new USL Super League. Reese has said before she wants to own a WNBA team one day.
Representatives for Bueckers and Unrivaled did not immediately respond to Front Office Sports’ request for comment.
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