There are nights when the home office of Tom Wistrcill has multiple games up, but as his mind races, he sits back in his chair and pulls out a guitar to help clear his mind and help craft the next great thing for the Big Sky Conference.
It is a fitting image for a commissioner whose job lies at the intersection of tradition and innovation. The television flickers between late-night kickoffs in Missoula, Bozeman, or Flagstaff, basketball games grinding through conference play, and a constant stream of emails from presidents, athletic directors, and national stakeholders. When the noise gets loud, Wistrcill does what he has always done. He slows it down. He strums a few chords. He thinks about what matters and what comes next.
For the Big Sky Conference, what comes next may look different than anything the league has done before. And Wistrcill is comfortable being the one to play the first note.
Playing for the front of the jersey
Ask Wistrcill for a 30-second recruiting pitch, and he does not start with facilities, championships, or television contracts. He starts with demographics and the makeup of one of the most consistent conferences in the country.
“Anytime there’s a state name in the school, it’s really important to the people in that community,” he said. “Whether it’s Arizona, Colorado, Utah, Montana, Idaho, or Washington, what happens at that school matters. Come be a part of something that’s important.”
It is a philosophy that has become central to the Big Sky’s identity. These are institutions that sit at the heart of their states and regions, where athletics is still a front porch to the university rather than a corporate silo.
“I believe we’re the true college athletics now,” Wistrcill said. “Our student-athletes are still playing for the front of their jersey, not the back. Is there some revenue sharing going on? Yes. Are we talking millions of dollars and locker rooms split because of that? Absolutely not. And that’s the beauty of the Big Sky Conference.”
That grounding has helped the conference thrive in a volatile era. Football success, Olympic sport championships, and consistent NCAA Tournament appearances in multiple sports have all followed. But Wistrcill is the first to say that pride alone does not pay the bills.
A commissioner with an AD’s perspective
Wistrcill’s path to the commissioner’s chair is not typical. Before taking over the Big Sky in the fall of 2018, he spent six years as a Division I FBS athletic director, seven years in senior leadership roles at Power Five athletic departments, and more than a decade working as a conference commissioner at the Northern Sun Intercollegiate and Rocky Mountain Athletic conferences. At the time of his hiring, he was one of just two Division I commissioners who had also served as an FBS athletic director, alongside former Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby.
That experience matters.
“Having sat in the chair gives me a unique perspective on what our ADs are going through,” Wistrcill said. “I can look at decisions or national issues and say, ‘That’s not really going to fly on campus, and here’s why.’”
It also explains why his presidents are at the forefront of the conference’s success.
“We’ve got great leadership. There are no egos in our presidents’ room,” he said. “They care about graduation. They care about educational opportunity. That starts at the top.”
In July, that alignment was rewarded with a five-year contract extension through 2030, following a tenure marked by record-setting gains in revenue generation, media exposure, and the addition of two new member institutions. It is a vote of confidence in both the man and the direction.
Jersey Patches … as a Conference?
For all the traditional markers of success, the most forward-looking part of Wistrcill’s vision sits quite literally on the front of the jersey.
Corporate jersey patches, common in professional sports, are poised to enter college athletics. As of now, NCAA rules still prohibit commercial sponsorship logos on game uniforms beyond the apparel manufacturer’s mark. But change is coming.
In October 2025, the NCAA Division I Administrative Committee introduced a proposal that would allow schools to place additional commercial logos on uniforms, apparel, and equipment during non-NCAA championship competition. The proposal is widely expected to be voted on in January 2026, with potential implementation beginning Aug. 1, 2026, for the 2026–27 season.
Several schools are already preparing. UNLV announced a five-year, $11 million multisport jersey patch deal with Las Vegas-based Acesso Biologics, brokered by Learfield. LSU has reportedly also signed a multimillion-dollar, all-sports patch agreement.
Wistrcill is not waiting or standing pat on the opportunity.
Rather than letting each institution navigate the space individually, he took a different approach. Drawing on his sales and marketing background, he asked his presidents and athletic directors for a window of time.
“What if I tried to sell this as a whole?” he asked them.
They bought in and said yes as he took almost a multi-media rights deal to jersey patches.
Since then, Wistrcill has pitched close to a dozen companies, with plans to approach several more before February. The concept is simple and clear. One jersey patch sponsor. One logo. Across the entire conference. Men’s and women’s basketball, soccer, Olympic sports, and football. Every uniform. Every photo. Every ESPN+ broadcast. Every social media post.
“There’s one thing to sell,” he said. “It’s a pretty clear message to potential sponsors.”
The exclusivity is the point.
“We’re talking hundreds of millions of impressions,” Wistrcill said. “From August to mid-June. One sponsor, next to the Big Sky logo, for every student-athlete. It becomes part of an overall identity.”
If a company says yes and the board approves it, the deal is done. No second sponsor. No competing logos. But more importantly, one check that gets distributed back to member schools.
Threading the needle
Executing this idea has required careful navigation. Many Big Sky schools have existing multimedia rights agreements with Learfield or third-party partners. To make the concept viable, Wistrcill is seeking to work directly with each institution’s multimedia rights holder in an effort to establish a contingency that would effectively buy back those rights for this specific asset.
“The premise is, ‘Here’s what I think the value is, and I’m going to write you a check for this,’” he said.
He similarly has engaged his membership, asking, “What if you received X for this?” with the conference office managing the terms with the multimedia rights partners on behalf of its schools. “There’s a potential win-win-win opportunity for our MMR partners, our schools, and a brand,” Wistrcill said.
The response was once again positive.
From there, Wistrcill built a conference-wide valuation that he is beginning to take to market. The goal is clear. The deal must generate more revenue collectively than schools would make selling patches individually. If it does not, the rights revert to the institutions sometime in early 2026, giving them time to pursue their own agreements.
The sponsor profile matters, too. Some categories are off the table to avoid campus conflicts. Others fit naturally with the Big Sky’s footprint and identity.
“What’s fascinating is how many jersey patch sponsors you’ve never heard of,” Wistrcill said, pointing to professional examples like the Lakers’ partnership with a South Korean food company. “It’s about brand introduction and ownership.”
For the right company, the Big Sky offers something rare. Scale without clutter. Geography without oversaturation. Authenticity without dilution.
A new revenue reality
At its core, the jersey patch initiative reflects Wistrcill’s understanding of the modern commissioner’s job.
“Part of my role is to continually drive new revenue streams and send more money back to our schools,” he said. “Every single one of them needs new revenue.”
With athlete revenue sharing already here and operating costs continuing to rise, that reality is unavoidable. What is avoidable, in Wistrcill’s mind, is chasing revenue at the expense of identity.
The patch, if approved, will sit next to the Big Sky logo.
“It’s still playing for the front of the jersey,” he said. “This just helps keep the lights on.”
Winning, exposure, and the national stage
On the competitive side, Wistrcill does not shy away from ambition. He jokingly reminds anyone who asks that the Big Sky has not won an FCS football national championship since 2010. He has personally gone 0-for-4 in title games as commissioner.
“I’d really love to celebrate with one of our teams winning a national championship,” he said, smiling.
Beyond titles, exposure remains a priority. Late-night kickoffs, once a sore spot for some fans, are reframed by Wistrcill as a branding opportunity.
“There’s a million bars east of the Mississippi,” he said. “Every one of those TVs is on that Eastern Washington–Montana game. You can’t truly measure that impact, but it’s meaningful.”
Looking down the street
Questions about expansion and realignment inevitably come up, and Wistrcill’s answer is measured appropriately.
“We’re proud of who we are,” he said. “You always have to be looking down the street, around the corner. The future is hard to predict.”
The addition of Southern Utah and Utah Tech in June of this year reflects that mindset.
“There’s always going to be a home for schools like ours,” Wistrcill said. “There are too many like us.”
He points to the economic impact of FCS playoff games in places like Montana, where home contests are estimated to generate millions locally.
“These home games are generating five, ten, and 15 million dollars economically,” he said. “They mean so much to these campuses and institutions. I think it beats out any bowl game any day.”
Still strumming
Away from spreadsheets and sponsorship decks, Wistrcill remains a student of music. He plays guitar. He even sings. He knows the words to almost every 1980s song. He laughs at stories of being humbled on the basketball court, like the day Tony Bennett dropped 34 on him … in one half in a summer game and clarified his own athletic ceiling.
“Yeah, that was a day where I started to realize where I fit on the court,” he chuckled.
As the college athletics world braces for another wave of change, the Big Sky’s commissioner keeps strumming, keeps watching the screens, keeps thinking about what comes next.
And if, one day soon, a single logo appears beside the Big Sky mark on hundreds of jerseys across eight states, it will not just represent a revenue stream. It will represent a conference willing to move forward together, playing its own tune, without losing the melody that made it matter in the first place.