As college sports boom, Princeton’s athletics director says ‘our model is far from broken’

When Ford Family Director of Athletics John Mack ’00 sat down with The Daily Princetonian in April 2024, college athletics was shifting quickly. 

Name, image, and likeness (NIL) deals had reshaped recruiting; donor-funded collectives were a standard across many power-conference programs; and Ivy League stars were beginning to leave for schools offering athletic scholarships and ample NIL opportunities. 

Still, Mack was unequivocal.

“I don’t think we institutionally see [collectives] as a path of success for us,” Mack said at the time. “It’s been a means to attract kids to your institution, just because you are the highest bidder. That is never going to be who we are, it’s never going to be our philosophy.”

Two years later, the broader college athletics landscape has continued to change. 

Last June, a federal judge approved the $2.8 billion House v. NCAA settlement, paving the way for participating Division I programs to directly share athletic revenue with student-athletes, with up to $20.5 million in the first year. 

Maintaining its prohibition of athletic scholarships, direct revenue-sharing, and “pay for play” compensation, the Ivy League chose not to opt into the settlement. 

In the midst of the settlement, former Princeton standout Xaivian Lee transferred to then-reigning national champion University of Florida, marking the most prominent portal departure in recent Tigers history. That same summer, Caden Pierce ’26 announced his intention to redshirt the 2025–26 season to pursue NIL opportunities in his graduation season at Purdue University.  

Across the Ivy League, the compensation gap remains a topic of contention. In an interview with The Harvard Crimson, Harvard Director of Athletics Erin McDermott noted that NIL has raised recruiting challenges for lower-income athletes. Generous financial aid packages can no longer compete with full scholarships combined with six- or seven-figure NIL opportunities.

In a second sit-down interview with the ‘Prince’ on Tuesday, Mack’s confidence remains unshaken. When asked whether he still believed “the lifetime value of a Princeton education will almost always exceed NIL opportunities at other institutions,” his answer was clear:  “Absolutely.”

“I think the value is as strong, if not stronger, than it’s ever been — of not just the Ivy League experience, but the Princeton experience,” Mack said. 

Mack pointed to what he described as a “really, really low number” of athletic transfers during his tenure, adding that student-athletes continue to cite the same reasons for choosing Princeton: a consistent four-year experience, a highly lauded academic environment, and the opportunity to compete at a high level without sacrificing campus life. 

“While I’m very aware of what is happening everywhere else in the world … we are more competitive now athletically than we’ve ever been,” he told the ‘Prince.’ 

He also pointed to the 17 conference titles this season and the current top-10 ranking in the Learfield Directors’ Cup Standings, which is a national ranking of Division I athletic departments.

“Our model is far from broken,” Mack said. 

“We can be successful being true to who we are … the more time that I spend worried about what other schools are doing is less time that I can spend focused on our teams, our coaches, and our student athletes.”

***

Despite Mack’s confidence, across the Ancient Eight, the boundaries of that model are being tested. 

In November, new University of Pennsylvania men’s basketball coach Fran McCaffery told alumni that supporters could contribute to what he called a “collective,” with money disbursed through “true NIL opportunities” and paid internships. According to The Daily Pennsylvanian, around 30 alumni were involved. 

With the Ivy League barring direct compensation from institutions, the initiative introduced by McCaffery and the Quakers is the most organized alumni-backed NIL effort publicly associated with an Ivy League program to date.

The Quakers have also benefited from the transfer portal, recently garnering a commitment from Notre Dame transfer Sir Mohammed, a former top-100 recruit out of high school. 

Mack told the ‘Prince’ that he doesn’t believe Penn’s efforts put Princeton at a comparative disadvantage. 

“Every school has always had different levers that they pull. I think competitive balance is something that’s easy to say, but it looks very different in reality,” he said.

Princeton too has benefitted from high-level student-athlete transfers in the past. Former quarterback Blake Stenstrom ’25, who played at the University of Colorado, re-classed as a sophomore at Princeton in 2021. Similarly, Sondre Guttormsen ’23, an NCAA gold medalist and two-time Olympian, enrolled at Princeton as a sophomore in 2020 after transferring from UCLA. 

Mack emphasized that aside from isolated cases, “it’s really, really, rare” for Princeton to admit athletic transfers. “That’s not what our university’s transfer program was designed to do.”

Princeton reopened undergraduate transfer admission in 2018, emphasizing community-college students, military veterans, and other nontraditional applicants. 

When asked about the current rules regarding athletic transfers coming into Princeton, Mack said that “there’s no one-size-fits-all process,”  while emphasizing that all coaches recruit with an “eye towards” longevity.

Mack added that the portal’s accelerated timeline is ill-suited for Princeton, which focuses on a long-term recruiting process that allows coaches time to assess athletic, academic, and culture fit. 

“You can’t replicate that process in the transfer portal the same way,” Mack said. That culture, he argued, is part of what makes the Princeton brand durable.

“We have a name recognition that very few institutions in America have, which carries a lot of weight. We don’t have to do what other schools are doing to be successful,” he said. 

Mack did not dispute that money matters, but noted that the issue of students weighing financial incentives is a challenge that has always existed with Ivy League recruiting. 

“We have always, as a non-scholarship school, recruited against money,” he said. “Now our financial aid has increased, so it’s our financial aid policy against someone else who has a scholarship and maybe a little bit of NIL — different side of the same coin.” 

Recalling his own decision to turn down a scholarship to Michigan to attend Princeton, Mack said the recruiting pitch remains focused on Princeton’s long-term propositions: an elite undergraduate degree, Division I athletics, a strong alumni network, and what he described as a predictable four-year environment where athletes know their coaches and teammates.

“I don’t pass judgment on people who choose other options, because the reality is that depending upon the sport or the family situation, there are some decisions that just work better for families,” Mack said. “But for people who want the kind of quality experience that we have, who want the lifetime benefits of what this experience provides, I tend to think that there’s no better place.”

***

In 2025, that argument met its most prominent stress-test. 

The year before, when other Ivy stars transferred — Yale’s Danny Wolf to Michigan and Harvard’s Malik Mack to Georgetown — Princeton had seemed to have escaped losing a player of that profile. That changed in 2025, with Lee’s decision to transfer and Pierce’s to redshirt. 

However, Mack pushed back on the idea that Lee’s transfer taught him a broader lesson. 

“I can both acknowledge that [Lee] had an opportunity that very few students at Princeton or in the Ivy League will have, but also believe that our model still works and is still the right model for 99 percent of student athletes,” he said.

Mack’s argument mirrors McDermott’s, who said that Harvard has “largely stopped” losing athletes before graduation over NIL, adding that current athletes are arriving with a clearer understanding of what Ivy schools are able to offer. 

***

The eligibility landscape, meanwhile, is also shifting. 

Last month, the Division I Board of Directors directed the NCAA’s Division I Cabinet to advance an age-based eligibility that — if adopted in its current form — will allow athletes up to five years of athletic eligibility. Students’ eligibility periods will begin in the academic year either after they turn 19 or after they graduate high school, whichever comes first. 

The proposal is expected to pass and go into effect for current members of the Class of 2027.  The rule change will effectively eliminate traditional redshirts at power-conference programs and hardship-waiver extensions, replacing the current system with a clearer five-season window. 

Mack is in favor of the change. 

“I think it actually will be helpful for us and for the Ivy League,” he said.

Mack argues that the five-year window strengthens Princeton’s pitch. Because Ivy League rules do not allow graduate student recruitment, the proposal would allow athletes to complete four years in the Ivy League without foreclosing a fifth year elsewhere.

The COVID-era eligibility also created a similar structure, as dozens of Ivy athletes finished their degrees and used their remaining eligibility at graduate programs outside the conference. Mack expects the proposed rule, if adopted, to make that pathway more common.

“You get a four-year Princeton education … at the best institution in America, and … you have the opportunity to then go on and do an extra year and do graduate work, and, if you are at the level, to get NIL or revenue share payments,” Mack said. 

Nevertheless, Mack was careful not to reduce Princeton to a feeder system for fifth-year programs.

“I don’t want people coming here just because they think it is a pathway to something else,” he said. “This opportunity is for student athletes who want a specific kind of four-year experience where you don’t have to choose between practice or class … Those are the kinds of kids that we have always attracted and are still continuing to attract.”

***

While the landscape of college athletics has evolved throughout the last few years, Mack’s answer has not.

“I’m more confident now than ever in our model, and being true to what has worked at Princeton for the 160 years or so that we’ve been playing college athletics,” he said. 

Hayk Yengibaryan is a senior Sports writer for the ‘Prince.’ He is from Glendale, Calif. He can be reached at hy5161[at]princeton.edu. This is Yengibaryan’s 250th piece for the ‘Prince.’ 

Please send any corrections to corrections[at]dailyprincetonian.com.