The men’s basketball coach of Howard University has a bold plan for both his system and the university to stay current with the advancement of college athletics.
Kenny Blakeney has proposed to private equity firms and wealthy individuals for$ 100 million to purchase a 33 % stake in the basketball program, according to The Washington Post. In return, the Bison head coach is offering a three-way income split between the potential user, the school and the group itself.
Blakeney has met with investors and private equity firms to pitch his thought, according to the report, but he has not officially pitched it to the school.
Sportico has reached out to the school for opinion.
In his plan, the$ 100 million investment do renovate the player’s arena and improve the roster, giving them more opportunities to play alongside other players in the emerging era of NIL. When that system is in position on college, Howard might pursue independent living, pursuing its own media deals, and possibly acing an affiliate with a larger, more financially supported athletic conference.

” I do n’t want to have a two-tiered system where we’re not able to compete for the NCAA Tournament or the national championship”, Blakeney told the Post. ” And from what I’m hearing right now, that is a real possibility, that there’s going to be an NCAA Tournament that is n’t going to include everyone else, it’s just going to include those Power Four]conference ] universities and maybe the Big East. That’s not what I signed up for”.
The strategy also calls for collective negotiations with the players, which is the team’s acknowledgment of the growing action among school athletes to organize, such as the case with Dartmouth’s men’s basketball team and earlier by Northwestern’s football team.
Howard, probably the most famous historically black university in America, includes Kamala Harris, the latest Vice President and condescending Democratic nominee for President, among its grads. The Washington D. C. based school plays in the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference ( MEAC ) and—like its fellow HBCUs—is significantly under-resourced compared to Power Five schools and even some mid-majors.
Perhaps some well-heeled schools are looking to private equity to help, if not fully finance, some operations. Most importantly, Florida State has been in discussions with Sixth Street.
In the NCAA Tournament play-in large, Wagner defeated Howard for the next year in a row to win the MEAC. Makur Maker, the highest-ranked enlist to actually play for an HBCU, became the subject of controversy at the Bison plan as he favored the university over Kentucky, UCLA, and Memphis in recent years. Before the coronavirus pandemic started spreading in 2020, Maker just participated in two of the Bison’s five games, though. Maker now plays for the Raptors 905 of the NBA G League.
Howard spent$ 1.44 million on its men’s basketball team in macroeconomic 2023, according to figures it gives the U. S. Department of Education.