Unequalled is constant to make waves in ladies’s basketball. Throughout WNBA All-Star Weekend, the 3-on-3 league co-founded by Napheesa Collier and Breanna Stewart introduced NIL offers with 14 standout faculty gamers, a bunch led by JuJu Watkins, Flau’jae Johnson, and Azzi Fudd.
It’s the second straight yr the league has signed faculty athletes to call, picture and likeness agreements, reinforcing its dedication to constructing a long-term pipeline to skilled ladies’s hoops. Whereas the offers don’t require gamers to go well with up for Unequalled throughout faculty, they provide the league a powerful foothold with rising stars and supply gamers with advertising and marketing alternatives, media publicity, and monetary backing.
“This transformational, first-of-its-kind initiative brings collectively the perfect of the perfect and displays our deep dedication to elevating the ladies’s sport and holistically supporting athletes,” Luke Cooper, President of Basketball Operations at Unequalled, mentioned within the initiative’s announcement. “Investing in elite ladies’s basketball expertise is central to Unequalled’s mission.”
Constructing a Pipeline With out Stress
Watkins, who’s at present recovering from an ACL harm, has already backed the league as an investor. Johnson and Fudd had been on-site in Indianapolis for the announcement, whereas gamers like Notre Dame’s Hannah Hidalgo, UCLA’s Lauren and Sienna Betts, Texas ahead Madison Booker, and TCU guard Olivia Miles spherical out a deep class. Additionally included are LSU’s MiLaysia Fulwiley, South Carolina’s Ta’Niya Latson, Michigan’s Syla Swords, and UConn’s Sarah Robust and Kiki Rice.
All 14 gamers will attend The Future is Unequalled summit in Miami later this month (July 31–Aug. 2), the place they’ll participate in talent improvement, brand-building workshops, and content material manufacturing for the league.
The NIL offers, most of which run by way of the top of the 2025–26 NCAA season, are structured to assist gamers with out demanding rapid commitments to play professionally for Unequalled. As a substitute, the main target is on giving athletes an opportunity to have interaction with the league early, whereas sustaining full NCAA eligibility.
It’s a mannequin that’s already paid off. Paige Bueckers, who signed an NIL cope with Unequalled final yr, later inked a three-year professional contract with the league after being drafted No. 1 total by the Dallas Wings. Each Johnson and Watkins have fairness stakes in Unequalled, persevering with the league’s method goes past commonplace endorsement offers.
Unequalled introduced by Samsung Galaxy simply signed 14 of the highest ladies’s faculty hoopers to game-changing NIL offers.
We’re kicking it off with The Future is Unequalled Summit Offered by Samsung Galaxy in Miami on the finish of July 🤩 Keep tuned for extra 👀 pic.twitter.com/xhuCOewiWj
— Unequalled Basketball (@Unrivaledwbb) July 19, 2025
A League Considering Greater
Unequalled is coming off its first season and can return in January 2026 for its second. The league bought off to a quick begin, backed by greater than $28 million in funding, a media partnership with TNT, and plans to develop from six to eight groups by 2027.
Based to supply top-tier ladies’s basketball gamers a high-paying various to taking part in abroad through the WNBA offseason, Unequalled’s format, branding, and athlete-first method have made it one of the crucial formidable ventures within the sport.
By aligning early with faculty expertise — and never simply signing them, however investing in them — Unequalled is constructing one thing larger than a league. It’s constructing a future.
Full NIL Class Checklist:
Workforce NCAA Workforce
JuJu WatkinsUSC
Flau’jae JohnsonLSU
Azzi FuddUConn
Hannah HidalgoNotre Dame
Lauren BettsUCLA
Sienna BettsUCLA
Madison BookerTexas
Audi CrooksIowa State
MiLaysia FulwileyLSU
Ta’Niya LatsonSouth Carolina
Olivia MilesTCU
Kiki RiceUCLA
Sara StrongUConn
Syla SwordsMichigan
With its subsequent season across the nook and a number of the high names in faculty basketball already on board, Unequalled isn’t simply staying forward of the curve, it’s serving to form it.
