- March 31, 2026
- By Pablo Suarez
UConn sinking a last-second three-pointer to defeat Duke and head to the Final Four. No. 1 seed and defending national champ Florida falling to No. 9 seed Iowa in Round 2. Maryland women’s coach Brenda Freese delivering an intense (and instantly viral) pep talk to standout guard Oluchi Okananwa.
March Madness is living up to its name in 2026, with the men’s and women’s NCAA basketball tournaments scoring big on classic entertainment value. But new trends in marketing and the continued evolution of name, image and likeness opportunities for athletes are also playing starring roles in this year’s Big Dance, said a University of Maryland Robert H. Smith School of Business marketing professor.
As fans sweep up their busted brackets and restore their resting heart rates before the Final Four showdowns start this weekend, Henry C. Boyd III, assistant dean for civic engagement and clinical professor of marketing, weighed in:
Women’s basketball stars often have higher social media engagement rates than their male counterparts. From a marketing ROI perspective, how might the women’s Final Four become a more attractive buy for brands than the men's?
We’re living in the attention economy, which is all about engagement. We have to give credit where credit is due, and the women have done really well in this area. If we look at platforms like TikTok and Instagram, you’re seeing engagement rates two to three times higher in favor of women than men. If I’m a brand, I’m thinking I’d rather have a set of engaged viewers, even if it’s a smaller number, than a larger group with tremendous reach, since a lot of folks let it wash over them. Women’s basketball is here and rising, and it’s a good thing in the sense of opportunities for brands. The guys have to elevate their game on those platforms as we go forward.
NIL earnings in college basketball spike 92% in March, according to data from NIL deals marketplace platform Opendorse. Does this signal that brands prefer “one-month wonders” that go viral in the tournament, or are they pivoting toward multiyear deals with underclassmen to build long-term equity?
I’d say both phenomena are happening. March has become a liquidity event. If I’m a player with the magic and my team goes deep in the tournament, I could really see my NIL take off because everyone wants to get on the bandwagon. If I’ve got freshmen and sophomores, I’m thinking there are future equities there. If I’ve got juniors and seniors, they’re the ones that are going to give me the return on investment. But we can have both. In the short term, you get the spike. In the long run, you can build on the return on investment from stars that have established themselves. We’ve got a lot to learn, and you can argue that we’re experimenting since it is the early days of NIL. We’re trying to figure out how best to take advantage of when these athletes shine, and March is the time to do it.
Wendy’s is the “Official Dunks Partner of NCAA March Madness,” with a campaign centered around every dunk on the court being a cue to dunk your fries at Wendy’s. How might this approach benefit a brand compared to solely hedging its bet on a specific player?
Everyone remembers dunks. When it happens, it’s electric. Wendy’s sat down and said, “Let’s not anchor on a player, let’s anchor on a behavior.” The dunking behavior is the phenomenon. What can you dunk in real life other than a basketball? You can dunk your fries in your Frosty. From that standpoint, I think it’s very smart. We look at human nature, there’s a randomness to the tournament where you can get eliminated early, or a star has a bad performance. Suddenly, a brand is anchored on that person, which maybe it shouldn’t have been in retrospect. I think Wendy’s will get great mileage out of it.
In light of the absence of Cinderella stories this year, how can brands pivot when those stories are not the tournament’s primary narrative?
Cinderella is part of the magic, and the irony is if there’s no Cinderella, then market the crown. From the standpoint of the men’s bracket, the power conferences hold the prominent brands, and there’s a certain predictability with them. The blue bloods will always have very loyal and devoted fan bases who buy a lot of merchandise. From a brand standpoint, we don’t have to be as worried about anchoring on a Cinderella that could disappear by the Elite Eight, so instead we go with the crown.