Inside the Wichita State collective’s new plan to unlock ‘endless’ NIL potential

There was a time when Wichita State would have been a major player in the name, image and likeness world, back when the Shockers were March Madness darlings.

But seven years have passed since their last men’s basketball NCAA Tournament win, and when NIL officially kicked off in 2021, WSU was slower than most in launching a collective to help its athletes get paid.

Simply put, Wichita State lagged behind in the new arms race of college sports.

Since arriving in July 2022, WSU athletic director Kevin Saal has been determined to close the gap. In his first two years, Saal has helped overhaul WSU’s collective, which recently partnered with Blueprint Sports, rebranded as Wheat Shock Collective and hired a full-time general manager in Emily Hiebert, a past Shocker volleyball great with Hall of Fame credentials.

WSU has recovered from its stumble out of the blocks, but still has a lot of work — and a lot of winning — to do in order to realize its full potential in the NIL world.

Unlocking that potential very well could be the difference between success and failure in the new age of college athletics for Wichita State.

It’s now up to Saal and Hiebert to try to unlock it.

“Everybody wants to be a part of something bigger than themselves, but it needs to represent them with pride,” Saal said. “We’ve got to do a good job to get there and we’re in the process of getting there. You’ve heard people say it before: When Wichita State wins, it’s good for the community. We’ve got to get back to that.”

‘They stepped in at a time of need’

When a pair of former WSU baseball players came together to create the first collective for WSU, Tyler Weber and Tymber Lee never intended to run Armchair Strategies for the long term.

They saw a need and formed a solution, but when it came down to it, each had a full-time job and were active members of the Wichita business community.

Armchair was a passion project.

“We never looked at it to make us money or to use it as a profit center for us,” Weber said. “We all had a lot of love for Wichita State. I graduated from there, played baseball there. My wife played there, Tymber played there. Our intention from Day 1 was to get the NIL to a space where it needed someone working it as a full-time job.”

Armchair scored an early victory in April 2022 when it came up with an NIL package that swayed men’s basketball star Craig Porter Jr. out of the transfer portal. But Weber (Aegis Group) and Lee (Wichita Sports Forum) both used their own businesses to secure the deal, a constant theme in the first year.

In fact, Armchair faced criticism from portions of the fan base when it was alleged online that the collective was pocketing 20% of the money donated. Weber clarified that the language in the contracts allowed Armchair to take up to 20% from donations, but said the collective almost never did. He added that none of the founders made a profit when Armchair sold the business to Blueprint Sports, while Saal commended Weber and Lee for spending their own time and money to help the collective get off the ground.

“The Armchair guys stepped in at a time of need and they really helped the institution when it needed it,” Saal said. “They really did us a huge favor.”

Once Saal was hired, the WSU athletic department became much more active in its partnership with Armchair. Saal began educating student-athletes on NIL, set up a marketplace for them through Opendorse and helped secure the first outside NIL dollars for the collective in January 2023, when three donors committed a total of $450,000 for the next three years.

By the collective’s second year, Saal said WSU went from having nothing to “the ability” to distribute around $320,000 in NIL money to its men’s basketball players. This year there is “substantially more” in the pot, according to Saal, which should put WSU in the top-half of the American Athletic Conference.

According to Opendorse, the projected average for men’s basketball distribution in the AAC will be $500,000 this season.

That’s when it became clear to Weber and Lee that the collective needed full-time attention. It didn’t take long for Hiebert to emerge as their prime target.

After wrapping up one of the most decorated volleyball careers in WSU history in 2017, Hiebert had taught physical education in the Wichita Public School district and coached high school volleyball at Northwest — not exactly the business or fundraising background some would expect for such a position.

But what they believed made Hiebert uniquely qualified for the job was her status at Wichita State. Her name carries weight in the WSU fan base, having been inducted into the Shocker Hall of Fame in 2023, and at 29 years old, she’s also young enough to relate to current student-athletes and their experiences. She was hired in June, in time for the 2024-25 school year.

“Obviously there was no experience in the NIL world, but we knew she would be able to make very good connections with boosters and the alumni with her name being so recognizable,” Armchair’s Tyler Weber said. “The more we went through the interview process, the more it was obvious that it was a perfect fit.”

The collective began as a labor of love for Weber and Lee, their chance to give back to their alma mater and make a difference.

They found it only fitting that they pass off their duties to another former WSU athlete, someone who knows what Shocker sports can mean to the Wichita community.

“Wichita State athletics means so much to me because it has impacted my life tremendously,” Hiebert said. “It’s so amazing to be back in this new role and try to help in any way that I can because I want to see us be successful and all of our athletes be successful.”

‘She has that instant trust and credibility’

Exactly how involved schools can be in the NIL process is still evolving with every court ruling, but there is one certainty: having a full-time specialist on campus is an advantage.

Wichita State has joined the growing trend of schools to not only help pay for a full-time NIL general manager, but to also house them in their athletic department. WSU negotiated a deal with Blueprint Sports where 90% of every NIL dollar donated will go to the student-athletes, while the remaining 10% will cover administration costs.

So while Hiebert is technically employed by Blueprint Sports, she has an office inside Koch Arena situated right next to senior administration. Any question she has, she is surrounded by people who likely have the answer in Saal, Madison Stein-Mason (external affairs), Kent Hegenauer (business operations), Brad Pittman (facilities and operations) and Taylor Spyker (health and performance).

“It’s been so helpful in the learning process of this,” Hiebert said. “They’re literally right there, so I can just hop into their office whenever and ask them a question. They’re always there to help.”

In the nonstop world of name, image and likeness, no day looks the same for Hiebert. When she’s not monitoring policy changes, court rulings and portal windows, she’s busy fundraising, event planning and coordinating with WSU head coaches.

A benefit of partnering with Blueprint Sports, which runs two dozen other collectives, is that Hiebert has connections to other NIL general managers to ask specific questions or speak in general about how to operate on a day-to-day basis.

So far her favorite part of the job has been arranging for Shocker athletes to fulfill their NIL obligations by volunteering to help local nonprofit organizations. This summer alone, WSU athletes spent time with Wichita Children’s Home, Starkey, Kansas Food Bank, American Legion, YMCA and Habitat for Humanity.

“It has been amazing to see how they can impact the community,” Hiebert said. “But also it’s been great to see how the work has impacted our student-athletes.”

In such a new position, there is plenty of learning to do. But Hiebert has proven to be a natural at the relationship-building part of the job.

Saal has noticed how Hiebert’s credentials as a past Shocker great have helped her in that area.

“I’ve seen how the credibility of being a Shocker and a former athlete has played huge with our young people here,” Saal said. “She has that instant trust and credibility with that. And she gets after it. There’s not a whole lot that sits on her desk for long. She’s an educator. She was teaching young people. And ultimately, that’s what we’re doing is educating, so that’s a great place to come from.”

‘People in Wichita like to win’

The uphill battle facing Hiebert — and the heads of collectives everywhere — is the hesitancy from donors to embrace the concept of NIL.

Having been told for so long that paying players was wrong, some boosters can’t come to grips with the change. Others are turned off by their perception that the money is funding frivolous purchases by the athletes. And a select few simply reject the premise of paying players entirely.

Convincing holdouts to change their tune and opening doors that were previously closed is now Hiebert’s primary job.

“This is an extremely critical time for Wichita State to stay competitive with all of the other schools throughout the country,” Hiebert said. “I know some people might not agree with NIL right now, but it’s here. For us to stay competitive, we’re going to have to keep working on it and keep growing it.”

To Saal, it’s even more black and white: either schools get on board or get left behind.

“You simply can’t separate championship programs from NIL, not in this environment,” Saal said. “We can want championships and we can be opposed to NIL, but you can’t have those two things living in the same space. You’re not going to win championships without some element of (NIL). There is a minimum cost of admission to get into the recruiting process. So we’ve got to embrace it and Emily is here to help us do that.”

By Saal’s calculations, $2.5 million is the total number WSU’s collective needs to reach in order for men’s basketball, baseball, volleyball, women’s basketball and softball to rank in the top-third of the American Athletic Conference in their respective sports, which should position the Shockers to compete for championships with their ability to recruit, develop and retain talent.

Saal and Hiebert are tackling the challenge like a head coach trying to rebuild a program.

“When you’re rebuilding a program, you start by selling yourself and selling your vision,” Saal said. “You’re selling our core values, our student-athlete development, our drive for championships. It’s no different than recruiting. There will always be folks who are very generous and want to help out on the front-end to make it happen, and there will be some folks who want to wait and see if the proof is in the pudding and that’s OK too.”

And there’s another part of it: It doesn’t matter how great Saal and Hiebert are at selling their vision for WSU. In the end, the collective’s potential will be determined by how much the Shockers can win.

While Saal says there has been “significant” growth in donations, he admits there is still “a long way to go.” The quickest way to get there is for WSU, particularly in men’s basketball, to start winning.

“You can talk about core values and pillars of your program, but when people start to taste some success, then there’s a whole lot more credibility in what you’re selling,” Saal said. “As we’re working our way toward this goal, at some point as we’re pushing the boulder up the hill with some success, it’s going to pick up momentum and people are going to see that success and want to be a part of it.”

After spending the last two years talking to WSU fans in the business community, Weber said there is an unmistakable yearning for the Shockers to return to relevance in men’s basketball. They miss the thrill of the 30-win seasons, the championships and the trips to the NCAA tournament.

He is confident in the work that Saal and Hiebert are doing, so if WSU can even show a hint of returning to that level of success, Weber suspects the success of the collective will follow suit.

“People in Wichita like to win. It’s a city built on entrepreneurship and very successful folks who run their own businesses,” Weber said. “We’ve seen it in Wichita before: When we have good teams, people show up and they support. Not only do they want to see winners on the court and in the field, they want to be a part of it and they want to financially support it. So there’s an endless opportunity in NIL here.”