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*UPDATE – UNLV running back Michael Allen (a transfer from North Carolina State) also announced late this week that he, too, had left the team prior to Saturday’s game with Fresno State. Allen cited a lack of playing time for his decision to leave and stated that he “didn’t receive a dime” from the NIL collective at UNLV.
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College athletics are in a state of flux. Once the NCAA approved the Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) payments for college athletes along with the “Here today – gone tomorrow” transfer portal a few years ago, we are now operating in the era of “pay-for-play”.
This new Wild West Show of paying college athletes was bound to bring mayhem to major college sports – especially football and basketball.
Today’s NIL tale involves a star small college football quarterback who left the East Coast and moved across country to the University of Nevada at Las Vegas (UNLV) to play in his final year of college eligibility.
What could possibly go wrong? Plenty!
Matt Sluka was the starting quarterback for three seasons at FCS small division school Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts. A Psychology major at Holy Cross, the 6’3” 215 pound quarterback from Locust Valley, NY led the Crusaders into the NCAA’s FCS playoffs twice in the past three seasons.
Matt Sluka’s head coach at Holy Cross, Bob Chesney, left after the 2023 football season to become the head coach at James Madison University in Virginia.
With one year of football eligibility left, quarterback Matt Sluka claims that he was offered $100,000 by an assistant coach at UNLV to transfer to the Nevada school for the 2024 college football season. Sluka said that the coach told him that the money would be paid to him once he enrolled at the university.
Matt Sluka took his word. He enrolled at UNLV this summer and has been the Rebels’ starting quarterback in September’s surprising 3-0 start. The transfer quarterback from Holy Cross has passed for six touchdowns and run for another score during the team’s first three football games.
UNLV just climbed to its first top 25 ranking in program history – #23 in the Coaches Poll and #24 in this week’s initial SwampSwamiSports.com Top 25.
According to his representative, Matt Sluka has not received any of the $100,000 initially represented in that verbal offer made by the UNLV assistant coach.
Let the finger pointing begin!
First, the school’s NIL collective is having amnesia about the $100,000 offer made by an assistant coach to pay for the services of starting quarterback Matt Sluka this fall. The college NIL collective (known as “The Friends of UNILV”) did pay Sluka $3,000 this summer after the transfer quarterback attended an engagement on behalf of his new school.
Additionally, the Friends of UNILV claims to have made an offer recently to pay Matt Sluka $3,000 per month for the four month football season.
That’s $12,000 vs. the $100,000 allegedly verbally promised by an assistant coach months ago.
“Ladies and gentlemen, Elvis has left the building!”
UNLV has an important Mountain West Conference home game tomorrow (Saturday) as the unbeaten Rebels host 3-1 Fresno State at 2:30PM CDT in a nationally televised game on FS1.
The team’s red-hot starting quarterback will not be in the starting line-up or even the stadium on Saturday.
Matt Sluka surprised the sports world earlier this week with an announcement that he was immediately leaving UNLV after just three games. Sluka issued a statement indicating that he will play elsewhere next season in his final year of eligibility.
“I have decided to utilize my redshirt year and will not be playing in any additional games this season. I committed to UNLV based on certain representations that were made to me, which were not upheld after I enrolled. Despite discussions, it became clear that these commitments would not be fulfilled in the future. I wish my teammates the best of luck this season and hope for the continued success of the program.”
For its part, the university (as they are known to do) issued its own statement claiming to be innocent in this entire matter and admonished Matt Sluka’s representative for demanding money.
“Football player Matthew Sluka’s representative made financial demands upon the university and its NIL collective in order to continue playing. UNLV athletics interpreted these demands as a violation of the NCAA pay-for-play rules, as well as Nevada state law. UNLV does not engage in such activity, nor does it respond to implied threats. UNLV has honored all previously agreed-upon scholarships for Matthew Sluka.”
Not to be outdone, UNLV’s NIL collective issued its own statement on Wednesday which stated, “To clarify, there were no formal NIL offers made during Mr. Sluka’s recruitment process. We would like to emphasize that we have upheld all Friends of UNILV contracts this season and have not defaulted on any agreements with Mr. Sluka.”
The football player and his family say otherwise
Bob Sluka (Matt’s father) said, “We left there understanding that we were going to get a certain dollar amount for Matt to come there on the NIL deal, not a blowout number, but a reasonable, fair number.”
Mr. Sluka said that his son later received more than 25 NIL offers from other schools which included Big Ten and SEC universities. Those offers were up to five times the amount of money which Matt Sluka had agreed to accept by coming to UNLV.
Analysis/Commentary:
1. We’ve heard zero (thus far) from the UNLV football coaches.
Neither head football coach Barry Odom nor the assistant coach who allegedly made the $100,000 offer have yet to be heard from on this matter. If you believe the comments of Matt Sluka and his family, someone representing the UNLV football program made verbal representations about a payment to Sluka leading to his decision to transfer across country this season.
2. Note to college athletes. Get offers in writing and find a good attorney to assist with the paperwork!
For Matt Sluka, the young man’s big mistake appears to be not forcing UNLV to put the offer in writing prior to moving west. The player’s story sounds reasonable to me. His record of success at Holy Cross was exceptional. A top college quarterback should fetch a solid NIL deal. It is quite likely that other schools may have been willing to pay him as much or more than UNLV allegedly offered to Matt Sluka.
3. How much money was actually in the NIL bank known as the “Friends of UNILV”
When I reviewed the website for the school’s NIL collective, I found one story which indicated that the group controlled about $400,000 as of June, 2023. Another post showed that the NIL had granted every player on the UNLV women’s basketball team $1,400 apiece. With 15 players on the team, that was a total outlay of just $21,000.
The college NIL collective is controlled by alumni and friends of the school. It begs the question, “Who actually determines how much money can or should be offered to any one player?”
4. The UNLV athletics department may be concerned about its own finances
A few years ago, the UNLV football team moved from its longtime football home known as Sam Boyd Stadium and into the city’s new Allegiant Stadium (home of the Las Vegas Raiders). Their former football field was 50 years old, held about 30,000 fans and was in serious need of upgrades and repairs. Still, the school was paying up to $75,000 for every home game played at Sam Boyd Stadium.
Once the UNLV football games were moved into Allegiant Stadium, a report showed the average facility cost per game had jumped to $350,000.
In 2023 and thus far in 2024 (one home game), UNLV has only averaged about 25,000 fans per home contest at shiny new Allegiant Stadium. Depending on the average realized price for each ticket sold, the cost of the new football facility may consume a large percentage of UNLV’s football revenue.
Summary:
This is a story which really sums up the current state of college athletics.
A talented football player left his former school in search of $100,000 from the NIL collective of a larger university. He didn’t get the assistant coach’s offer in writing and got burned in the process.
The player abruptly quit his new school after just three games and will likely try to play for some other school next year. By not playing in UNLV’s fourth game this Saturday, Matt Sluka has been able to preserve his final year of college football eligibility. After quitting the program this week, Matt Sluka is allowed to go shopping for yet another school (with better financial credit) to play next year.
The assistant coach at UNLV likely had no idea how much money was in his team’s NIL collective at the time he had been recruiting quarterback Matt Sluka. It seems unlikely that the assistant coach would have made such a financial offer to Sluka unless the head coach had approved the dollar amount. Remember, the NIL payment wasn’t due for several months until Matt Sluka enrolled at UNLV in the summer of 2024. Perhaps the assistant coach expected the NIL collective to have been able to raise the cash needed to cover an offer to the team’s new quarterback.
The head football coach seems to have escaped most of the scrutiny in this matter (for now). If he wasn’t already aware, UNLV’s NIL collective is relatively small compared to the millions pouring into major programs in the SEC, Big Ten, and other conferences.
The NIL collective at UNLV is relatively small. However, there is no shame if the school does not have an alumni and sports fan base willing to contribute extremely large amounts of cash to lure top college athletes – even if their donations are considered tax-deducible through its Section 501 c3 organization status.
The NCAA, as usual, has let down college athletes, member institutions, and college sports fans by not having guidelines already in place to prevent this type of scenario from occurring. The current rules (?) governing payment of money via NIL collectives remain quite blurry. Though the initial intent was for top athletes to earn advertising and promotional money from commercials and personal appearances, these NIL payments are quickly morphing into a multi-million dollar money grab by the players with very few strings attached.
This week’s NIL dispute was over a $100,000 pyramid. At some universities around the nation, a similar game show is likely being played right now involving even larger sums.