Maryland-Eastern Shore Vice President of Athletics Tara Owens has seen many changes in her years as a college coach and administrator.
However, the recent House settlement allowing NCAA institutions to pay their players is a new challenge.
She is happy to take on the task as UMES announced earlier this spring that they would be opting into the House settlement (paying college athletes $2.8 billion over a 10-year period for missed NIL opportunities) and paying men’s and women’s basketball athletes.
“It is quite the experience, being a coach and now an athletic director and VP, you see how things have changed so dramatically, and we’re just trying to keep up with it,” Owens told HBCU Sports. “Also, we stand on our true values and giving our student-athletes the best opportunities academically and athletically.”
UMES’ decision to opt came with input from athletic and academic administration, deciding that giving players a chance to make money was the best path to follow.
“If we don’t get on board with what’s happening throughout the country, we’ll be left behind. We don’t want that to happen, we want to remain competitive while being ethical,” Owens said. “We wanted to invest in the athletes for what they’ll be doing for us and to try and keep up with what’s going on across the landscape.”
Owens says the NIL and transfer portal have changed not just the way an athletics program runs but also the people in it.
“It’s a double-edged sword. For schools like UMES, it gives student-athletes more freedom and more power, which I support,” she says. “But as someone who has mentored and coached young people, I want what’s best for them but on the other hand, we’ve become a feeder system for larger schools because as soon as we get a great athlete, we’ll have them for one year and they’re gone.”
To counter that, Owens says UMES’ mission remains education and athletic experiences that benefit the students and “creating a championship culture.”
“I try to look at it from a very positive standpoint. It signals that we’re evolving; we’re a part of this huge process that’s taking place. We are committed to doing this with integrity. We don’t want to be the school trying to keep up by not doing it the right way,” she added. “We have a greater impact on the total student, the human being side of things. We’ll stick to those things while giving financial support. Our men’s team kept three student-athletes and brought in 12, so we’re accepting that and understanding where we are. This is a great opportunity for us to get student-athletes that we may not have gotten otherwise.”
Owens also explained that UMES will be tuned into everything going on around them because risking the university’s future for athletics is not in the administration’s plans.
“We have to stay mission-focused and do the things we can do because we’re not trying to keep up with the Joneses and do what Maryland is doing,” she said. “There may be decisions that come down to us that make dramatic adjustments that we don’t know of just yet. We’re making sure we’re in line with Title IX and gender equity, so we’re only doing this for men’s and women’s basketball. Since we don’t have football, that puts us in a better position. I think we’ll be fine because we won’t make decisions that jeopardize the institution.”
