By ADAM ZAGORIA
Antoine Davis, the third-leading scorer in Division 1 this past season, is staying put, and has agreed to a Name, Image and Likeness deal with Chinese company GlowBalls potentially worth six figures, his father confirmed.
The 6-foot-1 Detroit-Mercy guard will remain at his current school instead of transferring to Maryland, Georgetown, Kansas State or and BYU.
“I wanted to win for Detroit and I feel like I owe Detroit that,” he told On3.com.
Davis, 23, averaged 23.9 points, 4.4 assists and 3.6 rebounds last season, including six games of 30+ points and a season-high of 39 twice. He’s averaged between 26.1 and 23.9 points every year at Detroit.
Davis, the son of Detroit coach Mike Davis, has scored 2,734 career points in four seasons and remains 933 points behind Pete Maravich for the all-time Division 1 scoring record. It’s conceivable he could break that record during the 2022-23 season.
“First he’s trying to get the consecutive games, 115 in a row. He’s at 111 where he scored 10 points or more,” Mike said in a phone interview. “Then he’s trying to get the all-time 3-point, which he’s 80 away from that. And then he’s trying to get to 3,000 points, which only 10 people got to 3,000. And then Pistol Pete is next [atop the all-time] list.
“But the most important thing is the NCAA Tournament .”
Mike Davis previously told The Detroit News his son would transfer because he could earn six figures in NIL opportunities elsewhere. He said Monday the NIL deal just happened to come through the day his son was announcing his future plans.
Under the deal, the company will produce custom limited edition GlowBalls for Davis for the 2022-23 season. Antoine is creating a custom logo for the GlowBalls, and has agreed to donate from the product sales to the Detroit Mercy athletic program.
“They’re going to give him like 20,000 balls just to sell, and then he’s going to give a percentage to his teammates,” Mike said, adding that his son could potentially make up to six figures in total.
“Yes,” Mike said.
“His NIL is like the real NIL because he has to sell balls. He has to sell that basketballs that he wants to share [the income] with his team and with the other athletes on the campus, too. That’s the biggest part of that deal.”
He added: “His image will be on there [the balls], like maybe all-time 3-point leader for freshmen in the history of college basketball. He basically has to have his likeness on there.”
Mike Davis said the transfer decision “came down to today and everything worked out for him.”
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