A New NIL Agency Model for Women Has Launched Here in Rhode Island

A New NIL Agency Model for Women Has Launched Here in Rhode Island

Digit Murphy knows sports. 

Murphy coached the Brown University Women’s Ice Hockey team and the U.S. National Team, before she went on to the National Women’s Hockey League and the Chinese professional hockey league. 

Now, she mentors top-level players and coaches, consults on the development of athletics facilities — and is setting out to reinvent the NIL space for women.  

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This fall, Murphy — a Providence resident — launched the United Women's Sports NIL Agency here in Rhode Island. 

NIL stands for "name, image, and likeness" and refers to the legal right of college athletes to profit from their own image, name, and likeness. The NCAA changed its rules to allow NIL on July 1, 2021.

Based on projections, the NIL market for college athletes is expected to reach $2.55 billion in its fifth year, up from $917 million in its first year. 

Currently, the top earners on the women’s side include LSU gymnast Livvy Dunne and basketball stars Haley and Hanna Cavinder, in a space where, sometimes, attractiveness and marketability can supersede athletic accomplishments. 

“I think that narrative has to switch. Women need to be valued for who we are and what we bring to the table - it’s like any woman in society,” said Murphy. “The old adage of sex selling is old school.”

 

From Coaching and Mentoring to Representation

“I was tired of the story of the elite controlling the peasants, and that’s what’s happening in my sport of hockey,” said Murphy. “I said that’s OK, I don’t need to get my knickers in a twist.”

Along with her partner Aronda Kirby — who together started the Play It Forward Sport Foundation — the duo started “brainstorming on new projects.”

“Some of the other projects I’m working on, one is an all-women’s sports facility in Indiana that we’re helping to fund; another is Tampa that is doing soccer and then hockey. I started to say, where can I help the most?" said Murphy. “This was pre-Olympics; I started working on my coaches’ academy and [helping] kids going to college and figuring out how do I work on marginalized populations getting opportunities."

"So I’m starting to get a growing online presence for my coaches and kids getting into college. That’s something that’s easy to do for me," said Murphy. "After the Olympics, my old GM from China, Shirley Hon, called me and said, what can we do together in the women’s sports space, because it’s really hot."

"So I said, why don’t we start an NIL agency? Take [American rugby player] Illona Maher, who did Dancing With the Stars," said Murphy. "I said, there are so many of those women out there. They don’t look like Suzy Chapstick — they look like her.”

And so the United Women's Sports NIL Agency was born.

“We founded the United Women’s Sports NIL Agency out of a shared passion for advocating for female athletes and actively connecting them with businesses interested in collaboration. UWS NIL Agency serves as a mentor, a star-building hub, a safe space, and a platform for exchanging trends and information,” Hon told GoLocal. “It bridges the gap between female athletes and the business and financial sectors. Our commitment is to invest in the athletes we represent through contracts, social assets, and our specialized skills. We believe in this group and are dedicated to ongoing advocacy.”

 

Flipping the Script

For Murphy, her goal right now is to raise capital — and awareness for — women athletes and emerging women’s sports. 

“The issue is that traditional models are still controlling the narrative. When you’re in a capitalistic economy, the issue is, we go by way of ROI, based on who is buying who has the resources, what are we selling. The old-school mindset is still controlling the money and controlling the resources. So when you go out to capitalize something, like women’s sports, or hire DEI candidates in the NFL for coaches positions, you’re going to get pushback. We’re in the pushback stage of women in sports still now,” said Muphy. 

“Title IX still isn’t in effect now. People think it is. It is not. We do not get the marketing resources — if we did, you would see equal crowds in the stands,” she added. “We do not have equal representation in coaching positions. We do not have equal budgets. We are still trying to make progress toward equity at the college level. And the NIL is just a reflection of the continued inequity and dominance of traditional sport.”

So now Murphy — as an agent — says she is poised to “represent the wants and needs" of female athletes and coaches. 

“When I go into a room I represent that energy, and they trust me to represent that mindset,” said Murphy of accruing a growing client base. “They’ll be branded by say Proctor and Gamble, and we’ll go on a tour doing an empowerment series on women and sports. We’re going to actually create the programming around the mindset and model. You’re not just branding them for being in the uniform; you’re branding them for what they bring to the community. That’s why you come be a United Women's Sports NIL athlete.”

“I have four hockey players - one who is black; a broadcaster in the hockey space; I’m talking with the Brown Water Polo team, the Yale and Brown hockey teams and the Olympic bobsled team,” said Murphy. "There’s also Izzy Scane of the lacrosse world and Breanne Bennett who coaches [hockey] at Colgate and who is also diabetic, I want to get a deal with her [in the pharmaceutical space].”

“Is a very creative model. I’m going one-on-one. It’s going to be a match, like Tinder. I almost want to create an app,” laughed Murphy, of finding athletes and coaches to represent at her agency. 

 

Breaking the Mold

“No one’s doing this right now. Because it’s too hard. This is really, really hard. But there are only a few people who are uniquely qualified, that are women, that have worked in different sports spaces, that have been leading the charge since 1972,” said Muphy of her expertise in women’s sports. “There’s no one paintbrush, that’s going to in a broadstroke ‘fix it.’ But if we start with these points of impact that we can make, people might start to go, holy sh-t, and for me, it makes me the expert on how to monetize women’s sports.”

Kirby — the former general manager of the Boston Blades -  said right now is “the most exciting time in the very young history of women's sports.”

“It seems everyone is interested in investing in, owning or operating women's professional sports leagues and the opportunities for women athletes are amazing. The business of NIL is just another one of those opportunities.  It's monetizing their own name, image and likeness value,” said Kirby. “It's putting those benefits in their own hands, and helping them build the skills to manage it to achieve their goals."

"I'm excited to build an athlete representation model that empowers these women to own their marketing assets, increase their earning potential and enable them to build wealth," added Kirby. "For me, being a part of building women's professional sports has always been about the players first, yes providing a place to play and lead but also about actively participating in their financial success.”

“No one’s cracked that code yet. Did the WNBA crack that code? Did they really? It took them 33 years to find a Caitlin Clark,” quipped Murphy. “I’m challenging the establishment like I always do.”