$1,700,000 NIL worth Angel Reese and $3,200,000 NIL worth Livvy Dunne take center stage on Sports Illustrated's The Money Issue

LSU student-athletes Angel Reese and Olivia Dunne, aka Livvy Dunne, have distinguished themselves as the highest-earning female athletes in a NIL environment dominated by male stars.

They appear on the cover of the latest Sports Illustrated magazine cover alongside an article by Stephanie Apstein on how they are changing college sports for women.

SI promoted the piece on its Instagram account:

"Led by Olivia Dunne and Angel Reese, LSU is setting the standard for athletes in women’s sports capitalizing on NIL deals. Stephanie Apstein on the women’s program ruling the new college sports economy, in SI’s ‘The Money Issue’"

Angel Reese's popularity skyrocketed after her dominant run in the NCAA tournament leading the LSU Tigers to the national championship in April.

Her On3 valuation rose from a pre-tournament $370,000 to the current high of $1.7 million. She has used this fame to promote female empowerment by forming the Angel C. Reese Foundation.

She is classified as the highest riser in NIL valuation by On3 after signing several lucrative deals, and one of the deals that propelled her value upwards was the one she signed with Sports Illustrated earlier in the year.

Livvy Dunne has long been the sole female student-athlete in the top 10 of the On3 100 valuation ranking and was only second to megastar Bronny James before Shedeur Sanders' surge to No. 2.

Dunne's valuation of $3.2 million and Angel Reese's $1.7 million are the only female student-athletes in the top 10 of the NIL valuation rankings.

Fame forces Angel Reese to switch to online classes

Angel Reese revealed that she no longer attends classes physically and instead opted for online classes due to her popularity. She spoke to Teen Vogue about her priorities amid the celebrity bubble.

“I don’t feel like I’m a celebrity, but I think a lot of people look at me as a celebrity now because of the impact I’ve had on not just women’s basketball, but sports in general, and Black women,” Reese said. “Things have changed for me. School’s first, basketball is next. I wouldn’t be here without school and basketball, so that’s my priority.”

The price of fame for Livvy Dunne

Olivia Dunne also had to stop attending physical classes and switched to the online option. The university had to hire additional security for her due to an incident with chaotic fans earlier in the year during a gymnastics meet at Utah.

"There were some scares in the past, and I just want to be as careful as possible," Dunne said. "I don’t want people to know my daily schedule and where I am."

Olivia Dunne and Angel Reese have raised the profile of LSU and are leading the way for female student-athletes in the still relatively nascent but male-dominated NIL-rich environment.