College basketball’s ceiling is now six million dollars
On3’s deal-based list put six men’s basketball players in college sports’ top ten — Momcilovic and Bidunga at $6M. The portal is pricing like football QBs, and the international pipeline is collecting checks.
Rupp Arena in Lexington during Arkansas at Kentucky in February 2023 — the building where Mark Pope’s Wildcats just paid north of $6 million to land Milan Momcilovic.
Photo: PCN02WPS / CC BY-SA 4.0
On3 stopped pretending NIL was a marketing score. As of July 1, its valuation model tracks compensation from colleges and collectives — deal-based, not a projection of endorsement reach. Pete Nakos’s mid-July top ten made the shift impossible to miss: Miami quarterback Darian Mensah still leads, but six of the next nine slots belong to men’s basketball. Football owns the absolute top line. Basketball now owns half the penthouse.
| Player | School | Valuation | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Darian Mensah | Miami | $6.5M | Football QB — list leader |
| Milan Momcilovic | Kentucky | $6M | Portal free agent from Iowa State |
| Flory Bidunga | Louisville | $6M | From Kansas; Big 12 DPOY |
| Tounde Yessoufou | St. John’s | $5M | From Baylor |
| Thomas Haugh | Florida | $5M | Retention over early NBA money |
| Massamba Diop | Gonzaga | $5M | Senegal via Arizona State |
| Tyran Stokes | Kansas | $5M | Incoming freshman |
How the portal priced the ceiling
Momcilovic, the 6-foot-8 Iowa State forward who led Division I at 48.7% from three last season while averaging 16.9 points, pulled out of the NBA draft in late May and became the last high-end free agent on the market. CBS Sports put his Kentucky package north of $6 million after a two-school race with Louisville; Arizona fell away when the money gap got too wide.
Bidunga, Big 12 Defensive Player of the Year at Kansas after averaging 13.3 points, 9.0 rebounds, and a league-leading 2.6 blocks, took Louisville’s check and helped Pat Kelsey’s Cardinals build what On3 described as a roster worth nearly $20 million. Retention works the same way: Haugh, a projected lottery pick, stayed in Gainesville — some reporting put his Florida package well above On3’s $5 million listing — while Yessoufou left Baylor for Rick Pitino with a Benin-born wing’s market price attached.
Roster budgets catching the individual star
The practical effect for College Court readers is simpler: a Final Four bet now looks like a football-sized operating budget with twelve scholarships’ worth of stars.
The international pipeline is on the same ledger
- Bidunga — born in Kinshasa, developed in Kokomo, Indiana — is now one of the two highest-paid players in the sport.
- Diop — Rufisque, Senegal, via Real Madrid’s system and Arizona State — took $5 million to Spokane.
- Yessoufou — from Benin — is the St. John’s centerpiece after leaving Baylor.
- Louisville freshman Boyuan Zhang — Changchun-born, 14.7 points for China at the 2025 FIBA U19 World Cup, then Veritas Academy in California — is on the same Cardinals books.
The dollars chasing Congolese, Senegalese, Beninese, and Chinese talent are the same dollars chasing Wisconsin’s Momcilovic. Global recruiting and domestic bidding wars are one market.
What “NIL” means on this list
Brand posts and local car dealerships still exist. What On3 is measuring is roster construction: schools and collectives writing contracts that can outbid a mid-first-round NBA guarantee for one more March. Protect College Sports Act talks in Washington are trying to harden caps and transfer limits while the SEC and Big Ten withhold support. None of that has slowed July’s published prices.