Boilermaker Alliance, the Purdue-focused NIL collective, announced on Monday that it signed Zach Edey, one of the top college basketball players in the country, to an NIL agreement.
Edey, a preseason All-Big Ten selection who is 7-foot-3 and 290 pounds, averaged 14.4 points during the 2021-22 college basketball season and helped lead Purdue to the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Tournament.
Because Edey is a Canadian native on a F-1 Student Visa, he is unable to perform labor or services in the United States for compensation. With that said, Edey is able to contribute to charitable services in his hometown of Toronto, and the ability to help local communities and charities is “one of the key tenets of the mission of Boilermaker Alliance.”
The Boilermaker Alliance stated that it was able to partner Edey with three charitable organizations in Canada, including Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, The Toronto Humane Society and The Canadian Chinese Youth Athletic Association.
“Zach is perhaps the most internationally recognized athlete at Purdue University,” Boilermaker Alliance President Jeff McKean said in a statement. “We felt very strongly about the impact that Zach could have on charitable organizations in his home country. From the feedback we have received, those charities couldn’t be more thrilled with the work that Zach has done for them.”
Edey made it clear that he is proud to be a part of the Boilermaker Alliance and he is excited to help out at local charities.
“As someone who has only done volunteer work a few times before, I found myself really enjoying it and I may not have discovered that without the Alliance’s help,” Edey said. “This is absolutely the right way to do Name, Image and Likeness. This way, it not only benefits our athletes but also various charities and organizations that we may be interested in helping support in our community or even globally.”
