Hunter Dickinson Admits Kansas NIL Money Was Deciding Factor in his Transfer

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Hunter Dickinson didn’t pick Kentucky in the transfer portal when he opted for Kansas. However, I do like his honesty about why he picked Kansas over UK.

It was not Bill Self over John Calipari. It was not the Kansas atmosphere over the UK culture. No, it was strictly NIL money and Kansas offered him more of it than UK would.

On his most recent “Roundball” podcast this week, the former Michigan All-American confirmed what many suspected about his decision.

“The people hating on me would leave their job right now for a $10,000 increase. I got, at Michigan, less than six figures (last year). I got less than six figures at Michigan for the year,” Dickinson said.

Dickinson considered other schools and some feel he “used” Kentucky to force Kansas to up its offer. If he did, fine. That’s free enterprise. Kentucky coach John Calipari did the same thing when he flirted with UCLA before getting that infamous “lifetime” contract from Mitch Barnhart and UK.

He called UK a “big risk” but praised Calipari’s record for putting big men into the NBA. He also said both Villanova and Maryland had positive factors but felt Kansas was the best financial and basketball option for him.

Winning does matter to Dickinson. Michigan was only 18-16 last season and both Kansas and UK should be top 10 teams going into next season. Maybe Dickinson also still thought Oscar Tshiebwe might return to UK.

But I also liked his honesty again about how even with more NIL money available it still was not easy to leave Michigan.

“I won’t say anything bad about that program because I still do love Michigan, I still love the school and everything, love the program. That’s why it was so hard to leave. I really didn’t want to leave. I didn’t. But I just felt like, man, it was the best decision for me,” he said.

“It took a lot of courage. I feel like people don’t realize how much courage it took for a guy who was there for three years, was an All-American. I had a legacy there and I basically gave that up to try to be selfish and do what’s best for me and my career, not what’s best for anybody else’s career.”