Several of us at CougConnect met with Andrew Gentry and some of his family today. First of all Andrew is a great guy. I felt like his personality is kind of a cross between Chase Roberts and Aidan Robbins. Super humble and great to be around.

He was very candid with us about his time in the portal. He has several offers from P4 programs but has BYU in his final few. While he was here this weekend we decided to meet up and talk about what CougConnect could offer him if he were to make Provo his home.

I think it is interesting that BYU’s offer, which isn’t his highest money offer, has a lot of appeal for distinct reasons. Andrew is studying business at Michigan and is nearly finished up there. The opportunity to connect with Marriott School of Business Alums is very appealing to him.

He also talked to us about the power of Cougar Nation and how supportive they are. He said he even talked with Jimmer Fredette and Jimmer was selling him on the power of the fan base and their support. I do think that can be a huge competitive advantage for the program. A passionate and invested fan base is appealing to players and is a signal that you’ll have NIL support too.

I think it is cool that with revenue sharing coming to college BYU will be on par with NIL offerings for recruits from most schools. But it is even cooler that BYU is pushing the mentorship and networking of the successful alum. That is not something every school can or does offer. Gentry said it isn’t really found at many of the schools he was recruited by in HS or in the portal.

Harrison Taggart told me that while at Oregon he got to meet and talk with Phil Knight a few times. But that he really has a great relationship with his mentor here. So it isn’t about just having great alum talking with the players. BYU is doing a lot of coordination to make it a great experience. It is resonating with several recruits I’ve talked to recently. I thought you’d be interested in reading about it here on CougarBoard

Shameless plug for CougConnect coming. If that bothers you don’t read further.

We were able to give Gentry a very compelling offer and he said it does help make BYU more likely. Who wouldn’t want more opportunities to network and earn more.

Gentry told us to feel free to share about our visit with the Cougar fans. He even said that maybe we would get more people to subscribe and create more opportunities for him if he did come. (Based on my conversation with Gentry I think he will choose a school before or around Christmas time).

So if you haven’t yet, please consider subscribing. It really does benefit the players in a lot of ways. I think we do a good job letting you chat with players and get reports too. It makes you get some value for your subscription beyond supporting players in NIL

Subscribe here if you can. It’s only $9.99 a month, but it all adds up. We will give hundreds of thousands dollars to players this year. Most of that comes from $9.99 subscribers. So don’t think your subscription doesn’t mean anything it really does matter. Go Cougs!!