Florida Atlantic loses to Northwestern in first round after Final Four run

Publish date: 2024-07-12

NEW YORK — Florida Atlantic can’t say it lacked March experience. But on Friday, after Northwestern forced overtime — after FAU had a chance to win it in regulation, before Johnell Davis trotted into a contested shot — the Owls lost, 77-65, at Barclays Center in the first round of the NCAA men’s basketball tournament.

The darlings of last year’s Big Dance, the mid-major team that made the Final Four, lasted just 45 minutes this year, five more than the minimum. They were buried by Ryan Langborg’s 27 points for Northwestern, 12 of them in overtime. FAU lost back-to-back games for the first time since 2022.

Still, so much already was different for the Owls this season. They were ranked for most of the season. They were a No. 8 seed here — as opposed to a No. 9 last spring — after losing to Temple in the American Athletic Conference semifinals. They were no longer an upstart Cinderella. They were known.

But because FAU is a mid-major program, the most pressing questions haven’t changed: In the name, image and likeness (NIL) era, with hundreds of players already in the transfer portal, can it keep this roster together again? Can it raise enough money from fans to keep a core of juniors — Davis, Vladislav Goldin, Alijah Martin, Nick Boyd — from leaving for power-conference schools?

Nothing lasts forever, but will the Owls make this thing last a little longer?

“I think everyone is concerned with donor fatigue and whatnot,” Dusty May, FAU’s coach since 2018, said Thursday. “We approach everything with the idea that we have to be working continuously for something that’s down the line. And me, by nature, I’m a big security person. We have been working since this team came back for next year to keep people engaged, to give access, to find different revenue streams to help our current players.

“And do we worry? Yes. Should we spend time worrying? Probably not.”

FAU defied the odds once, returning most of the Final Four squad. Twice will probably be much harder. Getting there last year, so close to the title game, made juniors Davis, Goldin and Martin want to run it back, meaning each of the four tournament wins meant a lot — meaning Friday’s loss could mean a lot, too. May, who has been connected to openings at Louisville and Vanderbilt, was another major factor. His future will be a major factor again. But NIL, however fickle, is the variable FAU will try its best to control.

This is college sports in 2024. Some of its most powerful people want to expand the NCAA tournament in a way that would curb mid-major access, further limiting those schools’ shots at money and exposure. And so success at a school such as Florida Atlantic is more delicate than ever.

“We say yes to everything,” Brian White, FAU’s athletic director, said of the program’s approach to NIL in a phone interview this week. It shows, too.

On its athletics website, FAU lists four collectives, the booster-funded groups that funnel money to athletes and play a major role in recruiting (and in the Owls’ case, player retention). Not all of the FAU collectives are active anymore. The Paradise Collective, which rallied donors last spring — which, in a lot of ways, saved the team from falling apart — is no longer operating. In its place, NIL in Paradise is leading the efforts, run by a company that has collectives at 35 schools.

Collectives are not officially part of universities or athletic departments. Once athletes could profit off their NIL, they were an outgrowth of that change, a way to pay de facto salaries through charity work or events with fans. When it comes to fundraising, FAU has distinct advantages and disadvantages. On one hand, because the school was founded in 1961, there aren’t generations of deep-pocketed alumni who want to see their teams succeed. The weather bumps indoor sporting events down the list of entertainment options. And before last season, the Owls were typically on the right side of .500, just not by much.

But on the other hand, there’s a ton of money, old and new, in Boca Raton. Most mid-major towns can’t say that.

“There is so much wealth, not just in Boca, but in all the surrounding areas — and so much business development — that we think it could be a huge upside,” White said. “I think there’s no limit on the success we could have here in the NIL space and the donor space and the corporate sponsorship space across the board. It’s not thinking about the long-term, like how do we have a master facilities plan that maximizes our student-athlete experience? We still have all that, but this is more current day, current minute, how do our student-athletes benefit from NIL as best they can?”

“A huge key is educating people about how their money can help,” said Griffin Kinney, a former Appalachian State basketball player who oversees the NIL in Paradise collective. “The school is newer. NIL is still very new. It’s all just so new.”

NIL rules have even changed in recent weeks. Thanks to a court ruling in Tennessee, collectives can temporarily negotiate deals and sign contracts with recruits or transfers before they enroll at the school. What was once under the table can now happen in the middle of the room. But it just permits what was already happening.

After the Owls made the Final Four, bigger programs, armed with far bigger NIL budgets, came calling. Davis, a 6-foot-4 guard with a scoring touch, could have fit most rosters. Goldin, a 7-1 center, could have filled a frontcourt need. With the Owls’ top players, FAU donors couldn’t match the highest offers, according to three people with knowledge of talks for what the athletes could make this season. But they could get close enough, then otherwise sell the secondary details: the campus, the beach, the chance to stick together and make another run.

“In terms of the NIL and stuff like that, they did a tremendous job helping us out,” said Boyd, who logged 17 minutes off the bench Friday. “Every single player on the roster had an opportunity to make name, image and likeness [money], which is a blessing, and you don’t see that much in programs.”

Those opportunities — local brand deals, paid charity appearances, T-shirt sales — are why the same team, just a year older, battled Northwestern in Brooklyn on Friday. Yet after an ugly rock fight of a first half, then a blown lead late, the Owls couldn’t find a spark. Northwestern outscored them 19-7 in overtime. Langborg, a graduate transfer from Princeton, nailed two pull-up jumpers and a pair of threes in the extra period.

So again now, far earlier than hoped, FAU will see whether it can recruit its roster back, let alone new players to improve. When White took the AD job in 2018, there were 74 season ticket holders for men’s basketball. This season, there were 800 people on the waitlist, hoping to see the Owls play in person. He has stared up mountains before, no matter the desktop background outside his office window. How much, then, does he fret about holding the current roster in place?

“Every day,” he said. “Today, yesterday, last year. In this day and age, it’s just reality.”

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Florida Atlantic loses to Northwestern in first round after Final Four run