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Morning Edition

April 8, 2025

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Florida won a thrilling men’s basketball title game over Houston Monday, in a game featuring zero Freshman starters. It sends a strong message about what’s possible in this era of the unrestricted transfer portal.

— Amanda Christovich [[link removed]], Colin Salao [[link removed]], and David Rumsey [[link removed]]

Florida Won National Title, But the Real Winner Is the Transfer Portal [[link removed]]

Bob Donnan-Imagn Images

SAN ANTONIO — On Monday night, 10 Florida Gators and Houston Cougars stepped onto the hardwood in the Alamodome to battle for a national title. Not one of them was a freshman.

The Gators outlasted the Cougars during a low-scoring, yet exhilarating 40 minutes. The Florida Gators started slow, as they often do—and so did star Walter Clayton Jr., who didn’t score until the second half. But in the final minutes of the game, the teams traded leads several times, and spent most of the final minutes of regulation within one or two points of each other. Will Richard led the team in scoring with 18 points, and Alex Condon followed with 12. Clayton Jr. got going late in the second half, contributing 11.

The game itself was the function of a new era in college sports. “Unrestricted free agency” has made it easier than ever for teams to build older rosters, a winning strategy that brought both the Cougars and Gators to the end of the Big Dance.

In 2021, the NCAA changed its rules, allowing players to transfer one time without penalty. Experience has always been a plus in previous Final Fours, though even champions during the first few years of the portal era had freshmen starters, like UConn’s Stephon Castle in 2024.

But at the end of 2023, after a federal court decision, the NCAA amended its rules to let players transfer as many times as they want. That new rule, combined with a lack of restrictions on NIL (name, image, and likeness) deals, has ushered in a period of “unrestricted free agency” that allows teams to stack experienced players from their sophomore seasons all the way up to grad school.

The Gators have a similar age makeup, but have relied more heavily on transfers for their starting lineup. Senior Clayton Jr., grad student Alijah Martin, senior Richard, and sophomore Reuben Chinyelu are all transfers, having arrived at various points during the Todd Golden era, which began in 2022. Condon, also a sophomore, was recruited to the Gators out of high school.

Houston had fewer transfers, but all five starters had plenty of experience. The youngest: sophomore Joseph Tugler. The program boasts two graduate starters in L.J. Cryer and J’Wan Roberts. Roberts is home-grown—he was on the 2021 Houston team that lost to Baylor in the Final Four. Cryer, however, was a transfer—from the Baylor team that won the national championship that year. Transfer Milos Uzan is a junior, as is Emanuel Sharp.

The trend isn’t limited to the two title game contenders. During this year’s tournament, everyone from Arkansas coach John Calipari to St. John’s coach Rick Pitino has talked about the lack of spots that freshmen currently have at top programs. “It’s very difficult to win with freshmen,” Pitino said earlier this week, referencing the freshman-heavy Duke [[link removed]] team that lost to the Cougars [[link removed]] just one day after Pitino made those comments.

The biggest question going forward: Does the new era of college sports mean that the days of the young teams cutting down nets, like Mike Krzyzewski’s 2015 Blue Devils squad, have come to an end?

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Women’s Title Game Draws 10M Fewer Viewers, Still Third-Highest Ever [[link removed]]

Nathan Ray Seebeck-Imagn Images

UConn’s 12th national championship win drew a massive audience for women’s college basketball—though it was well short of the record numbers Caitlin Clark and Iowa drew when they lost to South Carolina last year.

The 2025 women’s national championship game between the Huskies and Gamecocks drew 8.5 million viewers on ESPN platforms, the third-most-watched national title game, ESPN announced Monday. The game aired on ABC and had an ESPN simulcast featuring Sue Bird and Diana Taurasi that contributed 703,000 viewers.

The viewership for the March Madness finale, which saw UConn defeat South Carolina, 82–59, was down 55% vs. last year’s record 18.9 million when the Gamecocks beat the Caitlin Clark–led Hawkeyes.

It was also down 14% compared to the 9.9 million viewers who watched Angel Reese and LSU beat Iowa in 2023.

This year’s game, however, drew 75% more viewers than the 4.85 million who watched the 2022 game between the same two teams. That featured a few names from this year’s title game, including Paige Bueckers and Azzi Fudd, who both started for UConn, while Bree Hall and Sania Feagin came off the bench for South Carolina.

That game, however, aired on ESPN. The women’s final started airing on ABC in 2023.

ESPN also announced that full tournament viewership numbers will be released on Tuesday.

This year’s Final Four was also the third-most-watched for that round, though it was down 64% vs. last year [[link removed]]. The previous three rounds [[link removed]] were all the second-most-watched, while the first round was the second-most-watched since 2013 [[link removed].].

It’s clear from Caitlin Clark’s first year outside of the NCAA and her WNBA rookie season that she is an anomaly in driving up viewership [[link removed]]. However, it’s also evident that there is significant viewership retention that has boosted ratings [[link removed]] compared to the previous era. The question is whether women’s hoops can sustain and steadily grow their fan base.

From Fairways to Runways: Masters Brings Influx of Private Planes [[link removed]]

Amalfi Jets

AUGUSTA, Ga. — With the golf world descending on Augusta National Golf Club this week for The Masters Tournament [[link removed]], Augusta and the surrounding area become the temporary capital for private jets.

Located roughly 12 miles from The Masters, Augusta Regional Airport is annually overloaded with an influx of private flights landing on runways that accommodate far less luxury travel during the other 51 weeks of the year.

“Golf is synonymous with private aviation,” Amalfi Jets founder and CEO Kolin Jones tells Front Office Sports. “A lot of business is done over the golf course. So, a lot of high net worth people in business really appreciate that, and a lot of people utilize it as a big networking tool.”

The demand around experiencing the first and most popular golf major of the year has seemingly maxed out the capacity of Augusta’s primary airport, resulting in “neighboring” airports looking to capitalize on The Masters, too.

Aiken Regional Airport, which sits across the border in South Carolina, about 26 miles from Augusta National, has an entire page on its website dedicated to Masters travel, complete with a warning about delays due to high reservations. Daily ramp fees for parking aircraft range from $50 for small planes to $2,000 for heavy jets.

Jones said that Amalfi Jets, which has recently skyrocketed in popularity due to viral videos on social media, received a high number of last-minute flight inquiries, and had been looking at flying some clients into Columbia (75 miles away) and even Charleston, S.C. (150 miles), which would require driving several hours to Augusta.

Booking at the last minute can also increase the price of a flight by up to 60%, according to Jones. That can add up fast when the typical cost of a round trip for a party of eight from Palm Beach, Fla., to Augusta (approximately a 90-minute flight) can be $60,000 under normal circumstances.

The Masters usually welcomes crowds of around 40,000 people each day during practice and tournament rounds, so the number of tourists is expected to continue increasing throughout the week.

EXCLUSIVE

Zach Lowe’s Ringer Contract Is Non-Exclusive

Zach Lowe, who was laid off by ESPN last September, is free to pursue new TV or streaming gigs outside of his new gig with The Ringer, a source told FOS.

Read more about Lowe’s options in Michael McCarthy’s full story here [[link removed]].

For all our sports media news and insights, subscribe to the “Tuned In” newsletter [[link removed]], which will arrive in your inbox twice a week.

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Kellen Sampson isn’t just a part of Kelvin Sampson’s family. He’s a part of his contract [[link removed]]. There is a chance the 70-year-old coach will retire after a career that began in 1979. If he does, enter Kellen, his son and associate head coach.

In June 2023, Houston gave Kelvin Sampson a new contract that increased his salary from $3.4 million to $4.75 million [[link removed]] in a deal that is set to expire in 2027, the deal also saw a new paragraph entered into the younger Sampson’s contract titled “Future Employment of Coach,” which officially made Kellen the Cougars’ coach-in-waiting. (The plan officially begins in June of this year, adding a wrinkle to any possible Kelvin Sampson retirement.)

Check out [[link removed]] the Business of College Sports content hub to read the full article [[link removed]], and stay up to date on all things college sports.

Conversation Starters Adidas has released a Law & Order–themed commercial featuring Ice-T to promote the Anthony Edwards 1 sneaker. Check it out [[link removed]]. Four of the top five recruits from the 2020 women’s basketball high school class [[link removed]] have won national titles: Paige Bueckers, Angel Reese, Cameron Brink, and Kamilla Cardoso. The fifth is Caitlin Clark. Joe Beninati and Craig Laughlin have called Alex Ovechkin’s entire career since he entered the league in 2005. Listen to them [[link removed]] call his first goal and his record 895th goal. Editors’ Picks College Sports Revenue Sharing Could Make UConn Even More Dominant [[link removed]]by Annie Costabile [[link removed]]“It’ll ruin parity, that’s No. 1.” Islanders Charge $45 to Print Ticket for Ovechkin’s Record-Breaking Game [[link removed]]by Meredith Turits [[link removed]]Fans are reeling, especially after paying a premium to attend. Livvy Dunne: House Settlement Doesn’t Recognize the ‘Value I Lost’ [[link removed]]by Amanda Christovich [[link removed]]The LSU gymnast submitted a formal objection to the proposed settlement. Question of the Day

Will Monday’s national championship game outdraw the Houston-Duke Final Four matchup, which averaged 16 million viewers?

YES [[link removed]] NO [[link removed]]

Monday’s result: 70% of respondents think UConn has cemented itself as the greatest program in NCAA basketball history.

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