NHL’s Panthers reveal plan to get involved with NIL deals
The Florida Panthers soon might be signing a quarterback. Or a center who plays basketball. Or a goalie who plays soccer.
The Panthers are the first NHL team, and they believe the first U.S. major pro sports team, to establish an opportunity for college athletes to align with them as part of recent rule changes that allow college athletes to profit off their name and celebrity.
Florida unveiled the plan Wednesday, starting the process of gauging interest from athletes who attend college nearest to where the Panthers play — primarily Miami and Florida Atlantic.
“Right now, at the very least, we’re getting an understanding of who’s interested,” Panthers chief strategy officer Sam Doerr said. “We’re really trying to understand what schools, who they are, what program, kind of their social media following and then we’ll internally set guidelines about who will qualify for the program.”
Doerr is hoping the Panthers can have some deals in place this month.
“They’ll get paid probably per post or per campaign,” Doerr said. “They’ll benefit off of posting. It’s really taking the existing infrastructure of socialmedia influencer marketing and extending it to college athletes, but using a pro team as an extension of that.”
ELSEWHERE Seattle sets MLS beststart record
Kelyn Rowe and Raul Ruidiaz scored and the host Seattle Sounders ran their seasonopening undefeated streak to an MLSrecord 13 games, beating the Houston Dynamo 20.
Seattle (805) broke a tie with the LA Galaxy (1996, 2010), Kansas City (2000) and Real Salt Lake (2014) for the streak mark.
⏩ In other MLS highlights, Romell Quioto and Mason Toye scored as CF Montreal beat New York City FC 21 in Orlando to extend its unbeaten streak to five games . ... Jose Cifuentes and Diego Rossi scored and Los Angeles FC beat Austin FC 20 for the expansion club’s first home loss . ... Braian Galván and Andre Shinyashiki scored and the host Colorado Rapids beat Minnesota United 20 . ... Toronto FC snapped a sixgame losing streak with a 32 win at New England.
College basketball: Cody Riley withdrew his name from the NBA draft and will return to UCLA as a redshirt senior this fall hours before the withdrawal deadline.
The Bruins made a run to the Final Four before losing to Gonzaga in the national semifinals. Riley started all 31 games last season, averaging 10 points and 5.4 rebounds — both career highs.
WNBA: Breanna Stewart had 27 points and 11 rebounds to help the host Seattle Storm beat Los Angeles 7162 for the Sparks’ fifth straight loss... Brittney Griner had 33 points and 10 rebounds as the visiting Phoenix Mercury beat the Las Vegas Aces 9990 . ... Kayla McBride scored 25 points, Sylvia Fowles had 15 points and 11 rebounds and the host Minnesota Lynx beat the Dallas Wings 8579 to extend their win streak to five games.
Sentenced: Argentinian golfer Angel Cabrera, a Masters and U.S. Open champion, was sentenced to two years in prison on assault charges against his former partner. A court in the province of Cordoba, Argentina, convicted the 51yearold for assaulting, threatening and harassing Cecilia Torres Mana, his partner between 2016 and 2018.