502 Circle collective plays central role in renewed enthusiasm for Louisville Cardinals

Dan Furman, president of Louisville-focused 502 Circle, believes an NIL collective’s success can’t be measured by dollars and cents and a line-item budget.

Yes, 502 Circle has one of the most robust budgets in the country – sources indicate it to be in the $20-million range for football and men’s basketball – but just spending dollars doesn’t automatically equate to wins.

“We’re not just out here – and there are collectives around the country that do this – throwing money around,” Furman told On3 last week in a wide-ranging interview.

“We’ve got a system. We have a plan. And we have a purpose behind what we do. And for us, it’s not a race to spend the most amount of money. It’s a race to put the most competitive team on the football field or basketball court. A lot of collectives pound their chests. ‘Oh, $20 million.’ We don’t need to do that. In my mind that’s egregious. We just don’t need to.”

502 Circle created plan that goes beyond spending

Instead, Furman and the 502 Circle team’s plan focuses on smart fundraising tactics and launching a new media initiative that generates the “true NIL” the NCAA is looking for in a rapidly evolving post-House settlement world.

Plus, Furman and 502 Circle built bonds with the Cardinals’ athletic department leadership that’s sparked a sense of enthusiasm that hasn’t been seen around The Ville in more than a decade.

“From the get-go, we’ve been really creative,” Furman said. “Everything that we do, we try to be first in the industry to do it. What we just launched with Floyd Street Media will be extremely successful. It’ll have a lot of detail and player-driven content that’s going to really showcase our athletes and gives us a pure NIL scope to college athletics.

“We have the money to do what everyone else is doing, but at the same time, we want to build something around that as well. We want to build a community and build a sense of pride in what we’re doing.”

And Furman and 502 Circle want to win.

“We are competing here to be at the top level at everything that we do,” Furman said. “And look, Louisville has a long tradition of winning and success, regardless of what sport it is. I think we’re in the phase from an NIL standpoint and a collective standpoint where we’re grown to be able to support the department, and they’re going to be able to rocket that commitment. We want to be able to go compete for national championships and nobody is shying away from that.

“NIL has really allowed us over the last three years to put our name back in that conversation. There’s no hiding where we were. It tells the story of where we’re going.”

502 Circle helps Louisville transform rosters

And a lot of where Louisville is going comes from the success through the transfer portal. Nobody navigated the portal better this offseason than Louisville. The Cardinals landed the top-ranked football transfer class, and 502 Circle and NIL played a crucial role for new coach Pat Kelsey in reconstructing Louisville’s basketball roster. The rebuild resulted in the Cards’ basketball transfer class also ranking No. 1 in the country.

“We’re all aware that there was a seismic shift in our industry in the last few years with the advent of name, image and likeness,” Kelsey said. “From the very beginning, I was a huge proponent of it. … There’s no question in my mind. This is America, this is enterprise, this is capitalism. The young men and young women who participate at a high level of collegiate athletics deserve their share. It’s the absolute lifeblood of a program at a really high level that has national championship aspirations.”

But Furman, again, stressed that the transfer portal success didn’t come from just dollars and cents. And he also emphasized that you can’t budget for all the twists and turns that come in the battles to retain and land talent.

“The market, it’s so difficult for collectives to sit here and tell you how much they’re going to have to spend in the next portal window to be as competitive as they want to be,” Furman said.

“I think everyone says we go into these windows with X-budget. I find it really hard that guys are living up to that. Because I’ll be the first to tell you that our budgets didn’t – they were thrown out the window in the first week of the basketball portal. That’s just the reality of the world we’re living in. It’s been college athletics for a long time.

“That’s where you have to get creative and generate new revenue ideas. You have to find ways to support the athletes that you’re bringing to campus. It can’t always be about money. You have to be able to get athletes because of the plan you put around them, not just the cash that you’re throwing out or the deal you’re putting in front of them.”

House settlement impacts NIL collectives

Furman also openly admits, planning for the future isn’t exactly easy with the House settlement still pending.

The framework of House installs revenue sharing, roster limits and a new NIL reporting and enforcement mechanism. Judge Claudia Wilken rules on preliminary approval of the settlement on Sept. 5. But it’ll be early next year before it’s certified, and it’s unclear if Wilken will balk at some terms in the settlement.

While the settlement does not ban collectives, it could potentially handcuff them unlike ever before. Since a preliminary injunction was handed down against the NCAA in February, collectives have operated with ease. The NCAA even announced it was halting all investigations into the third-party organizations.

“There’s a lot of moving parts right now,” Furman said. “There’s a lot of collectives that are kind of looking at that and just thinking, ‘How is this where we’re at after all this time?’

“Collectives have turned into a proven, mature industry, especially that group that’s involved in The Collective Association. The question is going to be, ‘Hey, how do we all get together to help come up with a solution and not play advocate here? How do we all come together to find a solution and a system that works for the athlete and works for the universities at the same time?

“There is a model out there. It’s just a matter of both sides being open-minded to sitting down and figuring out how to make it work.”

502 Circle continues to generate excitement

In the meantime, Furman maintains that 502 Circle will remain full steam ahead with its efforts to help Louisville win in tandem with the university and coaches. He reports there’s been zero pushback from a fundraising standpoint since the House settlement was filed in late July.

“We’ll be where we need to be,” Furman said. “We’ll be competitive. We’re going to put our programs in position across the board to accomplish their goals. All of these schools are trying to sing the same tune of – we’re bringing all these athletes here and they’re not coming to finish fifth. These guys are coming here to win championships and play at the next level.

“How do we provide those resources? It’s the same thing we’ve been doing in college athletics for a lot of years. And the schools that provide those resources are going to have the ability to recruit and retain and generate a return on their investments with wins and championships. We’re confident we’re going to get that here at Louisville.”