NIL $$$ For High School Athletes – Missouri vs Illinois

Name, Image and Likeness money is changing collegiate athletics. High profile athletes coming out of high school now have to weigh not just opportunity within an athletic program, the school itself academically, and the campus culture among many other things. Also, now (high profile) athletes considering attending one school over another have to weigh potential NIL money.

Those high-profile high school athletes that will potentially draw big money in the form of crowds and media attention to a university are (on a smaller level) already drawing big crowds and media attention at their high schools. States have recognized that there is money there too.

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NIL money is being employed at the high school level in different ways in different states across the country. As of now there is no national rule for high school NIL money.  Want to raise booster money from local business? Have high profile athlete appear at local business on their own social media account and/or the local business. Can you do that? have a local athlete that is committed to a D1 program? You think the school could sell jerseys (and potentially signed jerseys) to local kids? How many LeBron jerseys could St. Vincent-St. Mary’s high school have sold while LeBron was drawing national attention to their games? What about LeBron football jerseys? He played football in high school too. Is he an extreme case? Sure. But $$$$.

In Illinois there is a $150 dollar cap (per rule 3.083) on monetary value of prizes at the high school level. Rule 3.084 regarding NIL points toward "Board Policy 35" which is heavily worded towards "May not" language. This is similar to many other state high school athletic associations guidelines. If you search online you'll see references to $75 dollar cap and $150 cap. Read the IHSA handbook of rules and guidelines yourself to see if those numbers are clear.

Meanwhile Missouri has far more verbiage regarding NIL in the MSHSAA handbook. Online talk is of Missouri using local high school NIL money to keep athletes in state. The long-held position among Show-me natives is that they lose their best high school athletes to universities out of state. So, Has Missouri attached a rule that if you take NIL money at the high school level you must attend college (re: get a scholarship) in state? There doesn't seem to be wording to that affect in the MSHSAA handbook. Again read it for yourself. Rule 3.6 to 3.6.7

The national experiment regarding high school level NIL money is just beginning. If there proves to be substantial money to be made, attention will be drawn to what works and larger media and new businesses will be built around the high school games.