THE EVER-CHANGING LANDSCAPE OF NIL
‘It’s done a lot for the women’s game’: Gabby Gregory on K-State NIL
After five seasons in women’s basketball — spending her final two at K-State — the star Wildcat guard gives her insight and perspective on how NIL is affecting college athletics and her sport
May 1, 2024
Senior guard Gabby Gregory flexes during her starting lineup introduction against UCF, sporting pink for K-State's annual Play4Kay game. The Wildcats won 60-58 as Gregory led in scoring with 19. (Photo by Madeline Willson)
Kansas State star guard Gabby Gregory came to Manhattan ahead of the 2022-23 season, quickly becoming beloved by fans and elevating K-State women’s basketball. She reached third in the Wildcats' leaderboards for points in a season with 648 her first year and helped push the Wildcats to a No. 4 seed to host March Madness her final season.
​
“I think it’s [NIL] allowed more eyes to be on especially the women’s basketball game,” Gregory said. “Putting more of an emphasis on growing your social media and profiting off of that I think has allowed more people to recognize us and then feel more inclined to tune in when we are playing games.”
​
NIL may be one of the biggest changes to college athletics this century, and it’s affected each sport to varying degrees. For Gregory, the full effects of NIL’s inception didn’t hit immediately.
​
“NIL didn’t affect my life too much until this past year, wasn’t until I started getting bigger deals that were actually of some substance,” Gregory said. “I would get little things here and there years prior when NIL first started. But it wasn’t until this year — I think signing with an agent really helped me.”
​
Gregory signed with Aaron Lockett, former K-State football wide receiver, who has a sports agency Next Page Sports which helps with NIL and recently opened a women’s basketball division. Lockett isn’t the only one helping Gregory find deals — K-State women’s basketball added Elisabeth Brown to its staff this year, who acts as a middleman between the team and Wildcat NIL.
​
“She kinda tries to get us little deals here and there,” Gregory said. “But for the most part, you’re on your own if you don’t sign with an agent outside of what’s provided to you from ... Elisabeth’s standpoint.”
​
There are two main ways players can make money through NIL: NIL deals such as appearing at businesses, sponsors and promotion, or through the Wildcat NIL collective. Gregory said the collective draws from donations that can be given directly to players, but it also assists in getting players deals.
​
“Let’s say we get somebody out of the portal and they say, … ‘If you come here, the collective can give you $100,000,’ that money’s coming directly from the donations that people are making to Wildcat NIL,” Gregory said.
​
Gregory said making NIL deals was usually a product of getting her name out there and not the other way around.
​
“The better you play, the deals come to you; if you’re popular with the fan bases and things, deals come to you,” Gregory said. “I still have had a couple of deals — like my Great Clips ad, one of those went super viral on Instagram Reels. I got a lot of followers from that I guess, and little things like that, but usually it’s the other way around.”
​
Although more deals may come to athletes for better play, NIL compensation is not “provided in exchange for, or conditioned upon, their athletic performance or attendance,” according to the university’s NIL policy. Gregory said this means the money made from it cannot be taken away because of performance or attendance, a security not always promised with athletic scholarships.
A teary-eyed Gregory walks back to the bench in the fourth quarter against Texas Jan. 13 after reaggravating her ankle injury from earlier in the game. Gregory saw limited minutes in the following game against KU but was back to full time after it. (Photo by Carter Schaffer)
“When it gets into performance-based then it’s considered cheating,” Gregory said. “Technically, if you're promised this amount of money, even if you get injured, they're still supposed to give you that money. … If you're supposed to get whatever amount of money and you sign something and say that you're going to get that money, it's going to come to you whether you play every minute of every game or if you don't.”
​
She also talked about the differences between her sport and others at K-State and between other schools. She said while women’s basketball is up there amongst the women’s sports, there’s no comparing football or men’s basketball to what they receive.
“It kinda sucks ‘cause it’s not like that at every school,” Gregory said. “I would say that there’s a lot of other schools even just in the conference or just schools we possibly play against that those kids are getting affected way more than I would say that our women’s team is. And so I would hope that that would be able to grow here in the next few years, just to even get somewhere even close to what the men are receiving.”
​
Texas Tech, a Big 12 conference foe, is one school Gregory mentioned. In 2022, the team secured a $25,000 deal for each women’s basketball player.
​
“That’s just something that’s not expected from women’s basketball at K-State,” Gregory said. “It’s just not something that’s not here yet. And I don’t know if it’ll ever be here but it’s happening at other places.”
​
Gregory said closing the gap a little bit between women’s basketball and the men’s team in NIL is something that could be possible in the next few years “if people care about it.”
​
“I would hope we have a little something here at K-State to offer girls coming in,” Gregory said. “I have friends that have transferred places and things like that and obviously they’ve been told, promised different amounts of money and things like that if they go to certain schools. So I’m sure it’s helping some people decide where to go to school.”
Gregory's Instagram growth from her commitment to K-State to graduation. “Putting more of an emphasis on growing your social media and profiting off of that I think has allowed more people to recognize us and then feel more inclined to tune in when we are playing games,” Gregory said. (Graphic by Carter Schaffer)
 |  |  |  |
|---|---|---|---|
 |