Iowa collective CEO: Heels4Life raised 'money to keep' Drake Maye

The evolving landscape of name, image and likeness collectives allows universities to be more involved in the promotion and fundraising efforts of their affiliated collectives, following the NCAA’s latest NIL guidance released last October. Heels4Life Executive Director Graham Boone said the collective has asked North Carolina for insights into historical giving and how donors like to be approached.

“What I can say is that our university and our boosters club, the Rams Club, have been tremendous partners in helping us identify the donors who have always been such a benefit to Carolina and helping us establish a kind of unified sense of trust with them that we’re all working on Carolina sports together and that NIL is a new form of that,” Boone said last week in a phone interview. “I can only comment that our university from Bubba Cunningham to the coaching staff to the Rams Club, which is our boosters group, has been very supportive in how we can be immediately impactful for our student-athletes.”

Brad Heinrichs, the CEO of the Iowa-aligned NIL collective The Swarm Collective, said last week a North Carolina-affiliated collective was “able to raise the money to keep the quarterback from leaving.”

Heinrichs made the comment last Wednesday night, when he appeared as a guest on a show on the YouTube channel “From the Hawkeye of the Storm.” Heinrichs confirmed to On3 his comment was in reference to North Carolina quarterback Drake Maye and Heels4Life.

Player retention was a quiet but prevailing storyline of college football’s first-ever transfer portal window. NIL collectives played defense too, not just offense.

Depending on the behind-the-scenes details, the story Heinrichs relayed — and that Boone and a North Carolina spokesperson further contextualized, if downplayed — could potentially be the greatest example yet.

North Carolina was ‘able to raise the money to keep the quarterback’

Heinrichs used North Carolina in an anecdote as he contrasted the perceived alignment at North Carolina compared to Iowa.

“I talk to other leaders of collectives across the country and for example, I talked to the leader of the North Carolina collective,” Heinrichs said on the show. “And I said, ‘You know, how is it going?’ And he says, ‘It’s going great.’ North Carolina has a quarterback that was looking at leaving and they — the athletic department — gave the head of the collective the donor list, the season ticket holder list and then also issued a statement saying, ‘Give to the NIL program. You know, call to arms. We need your help.’

“And they were able to raise the money to keep the quarterback from leaving.”

On Dec. 7, Maye tweeted, “Could never leave this place, I’m a Tar Heel.”

Boone declined to comment on the specifics of the collective’s deal with Maye. Boone also said the collective hasn’t asked for, or received, specific lists of season ticket holders from the athletic department.

“As part of our marketing efforts, we would love to have access to those individuals who’ve already shown to have historical support for Carolina football,” Boone said. “Not to date but it’s something that we’d love to chat about because it’s another way for us to get our message out there and have everyone be a part of this.”

In response to a request for comment from On3, a North Carolina spokesperson sent in an email a link to a letter, which published on the athletic department’s website five days before Maye’s announcement.

The spokesperson said the department also sent the letter in a December email to donors and season ticket holders. In the letter, Cunningham, the athletic director, and Rams Club Executive Director John Montgomery thanked North Carolina fans for supporting their athletes’ NIL opportunities.

The Rams Club is the fundraising organization for North Carolina’s athletic department.

“Our position hasn’t changed,” the spokesperson wrote Jan. 27 in an email to On3, regarding the December letter.

The spokesperson added that the athletic department spoke with the Rams Club, which the spokesperson wrote, “they have shared limited information with Heels4Life.”

Mack Brown, Pat Narduzzi describe other schools’ interest in Drake Maye

Last season as a redshirt freshman, Maye ranked fourth nationally in passing yards with 4,321 yards. He finished the season tied for fifth nationally with 38 passing touchdowns.

In December, there were rumors and speculation that Maye could potentially transfer for his redshirt sophomore season. As one of the top quarterbacks in the country, who won’t be eligible for the NFL draft until 2024, Maye likely would’ve been the most sought-after player in the country if he had entered the transfer portal.

In December, a reporter asked North Carolina coach Mack Brown which schools, or representatives of which schools, were interested in Maye.

“I can’t say that. And don’t ask Drake,” Brown said. “He’s a young guy and that’s uncomfortable for him. You know who they are. Looking at all the ones that are getting the top recruits. They’re the ones paying all the top money. So, you can figure that out. Take two of those 10 and you’re right. You got it. And probably more than the two that I know of.”

Then another ACC coach added to the speculation.

93.7 The Fan’s Andrew Filliponi tweeted, “Pitt Head Coach Pat Narduzzi says on @937theFan that he’s heard 2 schools offered UNC QB Drake Maye $5 million to transfer. [Won’t] say who. But he knows who. Wow. Says it’s gotten out of control and it’s only going to get worse. Quote: ‘It’s a sad, sad deal.'”

Heels4Life executive director: ‘We stepped up to the plate’

In a late-December interview with ESPN, Maye downplayed the rumors but he also hinted at potential attempts by representatives of other schools to try to start backchannel conversations with him.

“Those rumors weren’t really reality,” Maye said. “Pitt’s coach ended up putting that out there. I don’t know what that was about. You have to enter the transfer portal to talk to these schools and hear these offers.

“There was nothing, to me or my family, directly offered from any of these other schools. Nothing was said or offered to the Mayes.”

The Mayes have a lot of connections to North Carolina. Maye’s older brother Luke previously starred for North Carolina’s basketball team. Another one of his brothers, Beau, is currently a walk-on on the team.

However, Maye also explained in the interview how he heard about the potential interest in him “through the grapevine.”

“Some people were texting my high school coach about it,” Maye said. “That’s mainly what happened, people reached out to some of my representatives and NIL media people.”

The story mentioned Maye’s NIL deal with Heels4Life.

Boone, the executive director of Heels4Life, told ESPN at the time, “We stepped up to the plate to be sure UNC was the best place for him. We wanted to make sure he had no interest in going anywhere else. Like Coach Brown said, he turned down a lot of money [elsewhere].

“That doesn’t mean Heels4Life didn’t step up with a very, very fair amount.”

In college football’s version of free agency, Drake Maye could’ve earned top dollar

Recently, Florida released four-star quarterback prospect Jaden Rashada from his National Letter of Intent after an NIL deal reportedly worth more than $13 million fell through. That multiyear dollar figure attached to Rashada was way more than a typical quarterback recruit of his stature could expect to earn or most donors would likely be willing to pay, even over three or four years.

However, a proven college quarterback with Maye’s talent who will spend at least one more year in school could potentially earn millions of dollars if he entered, or considered entering, the transfer portal as a pseudo-free agent, given modern NIL opportunities.

For reference, Maye has an On3 NIL Valuation of $1.3 million. The On3 NIL Valuation calculates the projected annual value of athletes’ NIL opportunities through their roster value to collectives and their brand value to potential sponsors.

However, the reported timeline of Rashada’s college commitments to Miami and then Florida also showed that a coveted quarterback who receives Power 5 interest from multiple schools could potentially receive more lucrative offers from competing NIL collectives and their donors.

‘I see that and then at that time, our athletic department hadn’t issued a call to arms’

The differing versions of the stories that Heinrichs, Boone and the North Carolina spokesperson described also hint at how schools have embraced the NCAA’s latest NIL guidance to varying degrees.

For athletic departments and administrators who want to have a hands-on relationship with their aligned collectives, the NCAA’s guidance stated that it’s permissible to “provide donor information or facilitate meetings between donors and NIL entity.”

Schools have had varying approaches regarding the speed and extent to which they’ve embraced the collectives that support their athletes. There has been tension at times between the fans, collectives and the administration at schools such as Iowa, Kentucky and Ohio State, for example.

Heinrichs contrasted North Carolina’s perceived alignment with his experience dealing with Iowa’s athletic department.

“I see that,” Heinrichs said on “From the Hawkeye of the Storm,” “and then at that time, our athletic department hadn’t issued a call to arms. In fact, they barely even recognized us, to be honest.”

In an era in which the NCAA has provided updated guidance to its members regarding its NIL-related rules, each athletic department is tasked with interpreting the sometimes broad language and then implementing an NIL strategy that maximizes its athletes’ opportunities to the degree that it’s comfortable.

“My request has been to get access to those season ticket holders and donors in one way or the other,” Heinrichs said in a previous phone interview with On3 in January. “I mean I would prefer the list just because then I don’t have to go through anybody to reach them but after that — and I can appreciate privacy rules and whatnot — I would appreciate the ability to send them emails to send out to the season ticket holders, or include us whenever they are petitioning their season ticket holders for donations or even just to ask them to re-up for tickets.”