UBooster, a Greenville-based Internet platform, is looking to give fans the opportunity to actively participate in recruiting college athletes to colleges.
“UBooster is simply a new, fun, innovative platform that is truly designed to fund the future of college athletics,” said Patrick Sapp, former football standout at Clemson University and NFL veteran.
Fans can go to the site and pledge money to a college if a specific recruit chooses that college. Sapp said the platform provides additional streams of revenue to colleges while engaging fans in the recruitment process.
“As a fan, all of us can be recruiters. That’s what UBooster offers,” he said.
Athletes will also be able to see how they rank with fans around the country through a “heat index” that displays how much money each athlete is bringing into the colleges. Once the athlete signs with a school, the company will route the funds to the booster club.
Rob Morgan, founder and CEO of UBooster, said the platform improves the experience of donating directly to a college’s booster club because, through UBooster, fans can see whom the schools are recruiting and actively participate in the process.
NCAA rules prohibit schools from providing specifics about whom they are actively recruiting.
“This is the chance to give fans that direct connection besides being a voyeur,” Morgan said. “It’s one thing to watch it, but it’s another thing to financially participate.”
Morgan said UBooster acts as a third party and complies with NCAA rules. Contributions do not go directly to the athlete, but instead to the booster program of the college the athlete chooses.
According to the site, at least 85 percent of contributions will go to the schools. A portion of the contributions goes toward processing fees and operational costs. All NCAA Division 1 schools are eligible to receive funds.
The site functions like a crowdsourcing platform similar to a Kickstarter model.
“UBooster was started due to the evolving requirements to compensate college athletes for use of their likeness and image, guaranteed full four-year scholarships, and increased stipends to cover an athlete’s full cost of attendance, all of which are quickly creating new financial obligations for hundreds of colleges and universities,” the company said in a press release.
“These are challenging times in the world of collegiate athletics and we think we have an answer to help all of these programs solve their problems from a financial standpoint,” Morgan said.
The platform launched first for college football programs, but will launch campaigns in February for other collegiate sports such as basketball.
Sapp predicted the platform would help prevent schools like the University of Alabama at Birmingham from closing programs due to insufficient funds. “Nobody wants to see these teams go away, [or] these scholarships go away.”
