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Losing Ground: With Hepburn and Storr Gone, Badgers Face Uphill Battle in NIL-Portal World

Madison, Wisconsin — Chucky Hepburn was overcome with emotion in the moments following Wisconsin’s season-ending 72-61 loss to James Madison in the NCAA Tournament’s opening round. Nevertheless, Hepburn was searching for a bright spot despite his suffering.

“Tonight wasn’t our night,” he told reporters in the locker room. “But we’re going to get back to this. This isn’t the last of us.”

Then, Hepburn reiterated that he would return for his final season. Yes, over the previous offseason, there had been discussions about colleges trying to entice Hepburn with non-binding offers. However, he had already come back to Wisconsin for his junior season and was poised to be a four-year starting point guard and senior leader whose fierce play on the court and devotion to the program won him over the fans.

Because of this, the Badgers were taken aback when they learned of his plan to use the transfer portal on Thursday. After all, if he could leave, then anyone could.

It would not be a leap to say that Hepburn’s move represents the most shocking one made by a Wisconsin football or men’s basketball player in the transfer portal era. The team’s top scorer, AJ Storr, registered for the NBA Draft but also went via the portal, meaning he will play for Kansas in the upcoming campaign. Having spent less than a year in Madison, he lacked the same profound connections to the program.

This kind of astonishment was not even seen when three-year starter quarterbacks Alex Hornibrook and Graham Mertz transferred because, in addition to their performances falling short of fans’ expectations, neither quarterback was assured of maintaining his starting position. Hepburn, a Nebraska native who won the Gatorade Player of the Year title, had committed to Wisconsin early in his junior year of high school. Only a month prior, after a defeat to Illinois, he had elucidated the significance of the Badger tattoo on his left arm. He talked about how happy he was to wear a Wisconsin jersey because it represented a family and a fraternity that extended beyond sports.

Fans of the Badgers were even more devastated by Thursday’s announcement because Hepburn delayed accessing the site following the season. Nine days prior, the Wisconsin basketball X account shared pictures of Hepburn and other team members warming up in the weight room with the comment, “Back.” From then on, things obviously progressed swiftly.

In the statement he released after learning of Hepburn’s transfer, Wisconsin coach Greg Gard recognized two themes that needed to be reiterated:

  1. Players at every level around the nation are making transactional judgments in today’s college basketball.
  2. This is the reality of college basketball today.

That is the main point of where we are because it would be silly to ignore the extent to which NIL has altered the terrain. The days of being able to anticipate seeing their favorite player progress across four years with a single program are long gone. Although not every player who transfers does so in search of more financial compensation—as of Friday, The Athletic had counted roughly 1,500 Division I scholarship basketball players who have accessed the transfer site this offseason—elite players have the ability to depart and fetch top bucks.

To be clear, Hepburn is not to blame for using the system that is in place, which allows for unlimited transfers and authorized payments through NIL, regardless of the reason he entered the portal. For far too long, institutions made money off of athletes’ performances, while players were kept back by antiquated NCAA regulations. Hepburn is not a lock to play in the NBA, therefore his worth as a college basketball player will never be as high, and you never know what kind of financial situation could come from his pro aspirations.

Hepburn’s father, Greg, did not respond to a text message seeking comment but did note in a reply to a user on his X account that “the numbers are astounding.” He went on to say that “I hate that young athletes are put in a position to make these choices. Love the opportunity provided to establish his future, but man, this opens undesirable & murky waters to navigate.”

As head coach, Gard must take responsibility for Wisconsin’s disappointing final stretch of the previous campaign, which saw the team drop from sixth place in the AP Top 25 to an NCAA Tournament first-round elimination. However, Gard’s only option is to give his players chances, which two of his greatest players—Storr and Hepburn—took advantage of. Storr almost quadrupled his scoring output after transferring from St. John’s to Wisconsin during the previous summer. Hepburn has appeared in 103 games since his rookie year, starting all of them. They both ultimately looked for possibilities elsewhere.

This brings up what may be the most important query going forward: How well-positioned is Wisconsin to compete in this shifting environment?

Gard said during a radio interview earlier this month that he and assistant coach Joe Krabbenhoft started an initiative more than a year ago called the “Sixth Man Society” as part of the Varsity Collective to raise funds, noting that the Badgers had been able “to almost triple our NIL collective in terms of men’s basketball in a year.” Of course, it’s hard to know what that means in terms of an exact figure and where those numbers stand in relation to other programs. What seems clear is that there is a cap on that number and that other schools have a larger pool of resources.

Wisconsin is hardly the only state dealing with this issue. Point guard Tony Perkins is departing the Iowa basketball team, according to coach Fran McCaffery, since his NIL market value is “something in the vicinity of $500,000.” Like Hepburn, Perkins was a multi-year starter and committed to Missouri.

Hepburn has not disclosed how much money he made from any of the collaborations he had in the previous two years, although he was associated with Degree Deodorant, Fetch Rewards, The Players Trunk, Barstool Sports, and Pepsi, among others. The University Bookstore has his autographed basketballs on sale for ninety-nine dollars. Hepburn said in an Instagram statement that his choice was “not a reflection on anything lacking at Wisconsin,” but in the wake of his announcement, it was difficult for others to accept that.

In an interview with The Athletic on Friday afternoon, Rob Master, the executive chair of the Varsity Collective, declined to go into specifics when asked what the collective’s maximum offer to a star basketball player at Wisconsin would be. He cited the individual financial circumstances of each player. However, he stated that additional work was necessary to guarantee the success of the group’s upcoming initiatives.

“I think the sustained and I think in reality the increased support of NIL programs is really going to be vital for us to remain competitive to pursue championship athletes and teams,” Master said. “The reality is that the college sports landscape, the NIL marketplace, is evolving very rapidly. And I think while we have a good foundation, this is not static. So I think our community needs to continue to lean in and embrace NIL and the Varsity Collective as this is what college sports is becoming.”

Master said that Gard was “quite involved” in talking about and arguing for NIL funding for the men’s basketball program, adding that two years ago, when the group was just getting started, Gard gave the group access to him. Master stated that the goal was to make Wisconsin competitive in all of its team sports, but she did not specify what proportion of the collective’s funds were set aside especially for men’s basketball.

“It’s not like we are a one-trick-sport school,” Master said. “That’s just not how we operate here. I’d much prefer that than I guess being like some of these schools who just really lean into one sport. I get that becomes maybe an inherent advantage for some of them.

“I think it’s a situation where we have so many competitive teams. But we have to look at that and say, ‘OK, there are some universities who are in different positions to take different strategies.’”

Master cited several revenue streams that he thought would keep the Badgers competitive with NIL. Despite Thursday being a difficult day for Wisconsin and its supporters, Master expressed confidence in the advancement and strategy the Varsity Collective was making. He announced a new partnership with Potosi Brewing Co. for their Varsity Golden Ale, whereby 20 percent of sales would go toward supporting NIL initiatives by the Varsity Collective. The cooperation for personalized beer was going to debut on Friday afternoon at Memorial Union.

 

He said that the collective’s donor base had expanded from a smaller group to include a larger one and that the group had developed programming to try to make it easier for regular fans to make contributions. This contains several Camp Randall Club membership tiers.

That does not change the fact that Hepburn left to “continue my journey in search of my dreams” and “explore new possibilities,” as he stated on Instagram. Although some may see his exit as a call to action, it will likely make it more difficult for many fans to support a cause when athletes are free to quit for any opportunity they see fit, which is entirely their right.

This is the current state of affairs in college basketball.

(Photo of Chucky Hepburn and AJ Storr: Kirk Irwin / Getty Images)

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