K-State basketball stars Markquis Nowell, Keyontae Johnson release Charlie Hustle NIL shirts

The vintage T-shirt company Charlie Hustle continues to put its stamp on NIL in Big 12 country.

After recently striking an NIL deal with Kansas guard Gradey Dick for a “Big Energy” T-shirt, Charlie Hustle is now partnering with Kansas State basketball stars Markquis Nowell and Keyontae Johnson on two new shirts. Terms of the deal were not released. But the deals were facilitated by Wildcat NIL, a K-State-focused collective. The shirts are now on sale on Charlie Hustle’s website.

“I was well-aware of the NIL activity Charlie Hustle had engaged in with athletes at K-State, KU and other schools,” Curry Sexton with Wildcat NIL told On3. “Given the success of Kansas State basketball this season and the individual successes of Markquis and Keyontae, I reached out to see if they’d have any interest in doing a deal.

“They were very much interested. So, we quickly hammered out deals. Markquis and Keyontae are such tremendous representatives of Kansas State. We think this is a great opportunity for them and K-State fans. It has been a pleasure to work with them.”

Nowell and Johnson are key reasons the Wildcats have been one of the best stories in the Big 12 this season. K-State is 19-6 overall and 7-5 in the league, generally acknowledged as the strongest in the nation this season . Johnson averages 17.6 points and 7.6 rebounds per game, both among the best in the conference. Nowell averages 16.9 points and has 191 assists.

Nowell previously landed an NIL deal with Robbins Motor Company. Johnson made national headlines last week when he announced a deal with Heartfelt to bring awareness to cardiac screenings. Johnson collapsed on the Florida Gators’ sideline during a game against Florida State two seasons ago.

Charlie Hustle making NIL impact in Midwest

Charlie Hustle is a Kansas City-based company known for its iconic KC Heart T-shirts and other NIL deals with student-athletes in the nation’s Heartland.

Along with the deals with Dick, Nowell and Johnson, Charlie Hustle has created NIL-inspired shirts for Kansas basketball players Jalen Wilson, KJ Adams and Zach Clemence. It also has done deals with KU quarterback Jalon Daniels. The company got into the NIL market initially with Jayhawks student-athletes like Ochai Agbaji and Mitch Lightfoot.

But the K-State market is also important to Charlie Hustle. The clothing company previously launched NIL-inspired shirts with Wildcats All-American running back Deuce Vaughn.

Charlie Hustle also executed NIL deals as part of its College Roadshow with a number of other Midwest stars:

• K-State basketball star Ayoka Lee
• Nebraska baseball players Max Anderson and Brice Matthews
• Iowa basketball player Patrick McCaffery
• Iowa State volleyball player Brooke Stonestreet
• Illinois basketball player Luke Goode
• Arkansas football player Ricky Stromberg
• Missouri basketball player Aidan Shaw

Greg Moore of Charlie Hustle previously told On3 that NIL deals are a a key part of the company’s business, and it can be a big boost to companies that don’t have the same massive operations as Fanatics and others in the college sports apparel industry.

“We can’t afford to just go through and fund all the big stars,” Moore said. “So, let’s be smart about it. It’s the influence. When you look at a company like ours, we’re great because of the KC Heart T-shirts, so now we’re embedded in the community.

“We asked ourselves, ‘How do you embed yourself in Ames, Iowa? In Columbia, Missouri? In Manhattan, Kansas?’ The stars are the student-athletes walking around. Ochai and Mitch gave us that first real case study. It showed that something is here, and we need to go into this.”