Nebraska football players to receive $7.5M from NIL deals that were once denied by CSC

CHICAGO — The College Sports Commission has approved name, image and likeness deals totaling $7.5 million for 18 Nebraska football players that were initially denied by the CSC early this year, athletic director Troy Dannen said Wednesday.

Nebraska restructured and then resubmitted the deals, funded through Playfly, the school’s multimedia rights partner, after an arbitrator in May upheld the CSC decision.

The Nebraska case was notable in that it represented the first major challenge — though surely not the last — of a ruling by the CSC, which was created by the power conferences in the wake of the 2025 House vs. NCAA settlement to police payments to college athletes.

The CSC initially rejected the deals because it categorized Playfly as an “associated entity” of the school, similar to an NIL collective. The deals were restructured to avoid the CSC definition of “warehousing,” a type of payment prohibited by the House settlement.

In the warehousing concept, a company purchases the NIL rights of an athlete without issuing specific deliverables. Full payments to the 18 impacted athletes will be made, according to Dannen, after the newly specified responsibilities are met.

“We don’t have a backlog,” Dannen said.

Parameters established by the House settlement permit schools to pay up to $20.5 million per year in revenue sharing directly to athletes. Many athletic departments are turning to third-party NIL deals to exceed the rev-share cap.

Nebraska and others used marketing partners such as Playfly and contracted apparel companies to fund payments above the cap. The result of the Nebraska case may lead to other restructured deals that prevent arbitration hearings and court battles.