Chicago’s Sports Innovation Leaders Convene at Blackhawks Ice Center | ESPN's $30 Billion Valuation

Chicago Sports & Entertainment Innovation Summit —Recap

Chicago’s Sports Tech community came together inside the Chicago Blackhawks Ice Center for the 2026 Sports & Entertainment Innovation Summit, hosted by 1871 in partnership with Levy and Chicago Sports Tech

Bringing together more than 300 founders, investors, operators, and team executives, this year’s summit transformed the Blackhawks’ practice facility into a hub for collaboration across the sports technology ecosystem — with panels and founder presentations delivered from a stage constructed directly over the rink.

From live startup pitches on the ice to networking sessions inside the Blackhawks facility, the summit created meaningful opportunities for early-stage companies to connect directly with professional sports organizations and institutional partners.

A Growing Innovation Hub

Bringing together founders, investors, and operators inside the Blackhawks’ practice facility served as a strong signal for Chicago’s emergence as a hub for sports technology. The summit reinforced what many across the ecosystem are already seeing:

Chicago is becoming a powerhouse in Sports Tech.

🏟️ Sports Funding & Acquisitions

⚾️ Schaumburg Boomers sold to Texas Rangers affiliate: report When attorney Pat Salvi first launched the Boomers in 2011, he took on a dumpster fire. The previous tenants of Wintrust Field, the Schaumburg Flyers, owed $900,000 in back rent and taxes. Worse than that, the fans and local businesses burned by the team were understandably skeptical that anything would change. Salvi helped turn the team into an instant success by leading them to the Frontier League title in their second year. On top of that, the team had the best attendance in the league for 14 straight years. After restoring pride within the community, the Boomers will be sold to REV Entertainment, which will own its second Chicagoland baseball team. With no plans announced for any relocation, Schaumburg can hope its standing as a top team within the Frontier League continues under new management. Crain’s provides an overview of the transaction and Salvi’s reaction to the sale.

🌽 Iowa Bears? Lawmakers Propose Bill for NFL Team The Chicago Bears sweepstakes just added another contender to the mix. As if Chicago-based Bears fans didn’t already shudder at the thought of Indiana swooping in to steal the Bears, Iowa shows it’s also capable of luring the Bears out of Illinois. Iowa’s newly proposed Senate File 2252 expands its MEGA (Major Economic Growth Attraction) program. This program is designed to attract capital investments from businesses that invest at least $1 billion into the state. Some of the incentives include a refundable tax credit of up to 5% and local property tax exemptions. Illinois legislators are now scrambling to contend with the sudden influx of competitors itching to take away one of the NFL’s original franchises. They only have themselves to blame. By disregarding questions about the Bears’ stadium funding for months, they opened a can of worms they can’t close. Now, Gov. Pritzker and others in Springfield must throw a Caleb Williams-esque Hail Mary to keep the team where it belongs: in Illinois. Front Office Sports provides more context on how Iowa has entered the contest to land the Bears.

🖼 Scottie Pippen auctioning $6 million of personal memorabilia One man’s dust-collecting items will become a highly valued treasure to a select few. Pippen’s career achievements need little explanation to anyone, even those outside of Chicago. He began collecting his jerseys and other items in his hometown of Hamburg, Arkansas, with no specific intent beyond remembering his own journey. After a legendary career and years away from the game, he’s offering his unique and valuable collection to the public through Sotheby’s. The undisputed most valuable item is a pair of game-worn Jordan VII’s. Michael Jordan wore them during the gold-medal clinching game from the ‘92 Dream Team. He signed them and gave them to Pippen personally in the locker room after the win. It’s a one-of-a-kind item estimated to be worth between $1.5 and $2.5 million. Sotheby’s will offer public viewing at their headquarters in NYC and open bidding at the same time from March 2nd to the 10th. Crain’s presents the full list of items going on auction and Pippen’s reasoning for offering them now.

⚽️ Chicago Fire FC Unveils New “Forever Red" Kit to Heat Up 2026 Season New MLS season, new threads. Described as a “modern refresh of a classic”, the jersey pays homage to the city while infusing twists to the style, such as the crisp knitted collar. The jersey will debut Feb. 28th for the club’s first home game of the season against CF Montreal. Last season marked a return to the postseason for the first time in eight years. The Fire also saw huge gains in attendance, breaking attendance records for the third consecutive season. Releasing the new home kit on Valentine’s Day before a highly anticipated season will lift the club’s profile and aim to build on the momentum gained last season. The official website for the Chicago Fire features images of the new jerseys and how to buy them.

🐻 Mike Ditka’s ‘Bears’ Super Bowl 20 worn sweater-vest sells for $183,000 Plenty of people wouldn’t pay $18.30 for a sweater-vest, let alone a used one. Obviously, this is no ordinary Goodwill-bound sweater vest. The 2025-2026 season marked the 40th anniversary of the trendsetting, Super Bowl-winning ‘85 Bears coached by the one and only Mike Ditka. Even though many fans still rock the sweater vest for games, his Super Bowl-worn version is the only one that could fetch close to a quarter million. Ditka has even signed a letter to confirm the sweater-vest’s authenticity. The size XXL sweater-vest will hang proudly among someone’s collectibles. If you think back to that ‘85 team, it might make you wonder: what size sweater-vest would The Refrigerator have worn if he also had one? And how much wall or closet space would it take up? Just a couple of random questions we’ll never know the answer to… The Athletic covers when the sweater-vest was sold and how the auction house Goldin acquired it.

🏟 Northwestern football stadium opening date has been set by the school For the past two seasons, Northwestern fans and alum have enjoyed the interim home field with lake views at Martin Stadium. Construction is finally concluding on its north campus home stadium, but the Wildcats won’t start the 2026 season at Ryan Field. The school has decided to align the grand opening of its new stadium with the original opening of Ryan Field in 1926. A century worth of football comes full circle under David Braun’s upwards-trending team. The venue promises uniquely intimate views for everyone in the stadium, taking a ‘smaller is better’ mantra that differs from the Big Ten’s powerhouse schools. Ryan Field will aim to keep the title of hottest ticket in the Big Ten, which Martin Stadium claimed over the past two seasons, in Evanston once it opens. NBC Chicago reports on the seating capacity of the new Ryan Field and its opening date.

🏀 Chicago Sky minority investor accuses owner Michael Alter of 'self-dealing' in new lawsuit As WNBA team valuations soar, not all investors feel they are getting their fair share of their investment. When Michael Alter launched the team in 2006, the standard expansion fee was $10 million. Steven Rogers, the minority investor spearheading the lawsuit, was among the Chicago-based investors who pooled funds to help launch the team. Now that the team’s valuation has exploded to an estimated $240 million, Rogers believes Alter has been cutting out minority investors from the gains. For those of us on the outside looking in, the lawsuit redacts all financial figures the plaintiffs are seeking. This makes it tough to grasp the full picture of the allegations. It has all the ingredients for a long courtroom battle between Alter and the minority investors, with an undisclosed settlement as the outcome. I’d bet those odds on Polymarket if it were a contract you could bet on. Crain’s provides an overview of the lawsuit, including the grievances filed against Alter.

🌹How Derrick Rose Is Transitioning To A Businessman Although his Bulls career was cut far too short by injury, few Chicago sports figures are as celebrated as Derrick Rose. And for good reason. He’s the rare homegrown athlete drafted first overall by their hometown team. He made an immediate impact, winning Rookie of the Year, and is still the youngest-ever NBA MVP at 22 years old. Post-retirement, Rose has shifted to making a lasting impact through business moves in the city he will forever call home. Similar to his edgy, above-the-rim playstyle during his Bulls days, he’s looking to invest in ways that differentiate himself from his peers. For example, he owns a florist shop, Rose’s. It uses his name in a somewhat overlooked industry that athletes don’t typically invest in. With revenue expected to reach $9.8 billion for U.S. florists, Rose’s wants to stand out through creativity and without a brick-and-mortar location. Rose is also diversifying his investments across industries as unique as sports hydration, construction, and freestyle chess, all based in Chicago. From Englewood to the United Center and now Wall Street, Rose is staying true to his roots while evolving in his business strategy. Forbes details the book Rose just published and the vision behind his business career.

🏆 Seahawks expected to be put up for sale after Super Bowl 60 vs. Patriots: Sources They do say the best time to sell is when you’re up. Similar to the Celtics after they won the NBA title in 2024, the Seahawks are rumored to be preparing for a sale after reaching the top of the mountain. Before winning their second Lombardi trophy, the Seahawks were valued at $6.59 billion, only 14th in the league. That could go up substantially after the win and possibly set a new record. So far, it’s all just a rumor. The team was bought by the late Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen in 1997 for $200 million. His estate stipulates that all of the Seattle-based franchises it owns will eventually be sold and the proceeds donated to charity. His sister Jody Allen has managed the estate since his death in 2018. With the ballooning buy-in price of NFL franchises and the Super Bowl-related inflationary spike, a sale could just be a hot rumor that cools over the next few months of the offseason. The Athletic provides context on the rumor and the other franchises Allen’s estate owns.

💰ESPN Valued at $30 Billion As Disney Reveals New Details on NFL Deal ESPN’s power play move to boost its streaming service is a done deal. ESPN will fully own NFL Network and earn licensing rights to RedZone and NFL Films programming. The deal between the NFL and ESPN had been in discussion for about four years before final details were etched. The NFL gains a 10% stake in its largest media partner, with the option to increase it in 2034. Both sides seem to have gotten what they wanted: ESPN wanted more valuable inventory to bolster its nascent streaming service, and the NFL wanted to offload its media assets rather than keep them in-house. The deal closed earlier than expected, and ESPN received a higher valuation than some expected. That’s just icing on the cake for ESPN. The Hollywood Reporter discusses the stipulations of the deal and when ESPN should integrate the NFL’s media assets into its infrastructure.

🤖 Anthropic and Atlassian Williams F1 Team announce multi-year partnership, naming Claude the team’s ‘Official Thinking Partner’ If you counted the number of AI-centered Super Bowl commercials, then this announcement isn’t surprising to you (there were 15 such ads). The next phase of the AI revolution is full integration within every large organization. Atlassian Williams is one of the few independent F1 teams and one of the smallest, but this move aims to put them ahead of their competitors. They aren't the first team to bring on a partner that touts AI as a major tool. But Atassian Williams is the first team to partner with a consumer-facing AI platform like Claude instead of a specialized enterprise AI platform. A title like ‘Official Thinking Partner’ is vague enough to wonder just how the integration entails. F1 racing is still far too complex to outsource and entrust AI, in its current state, with making sound autonomous decisions, but it's yet another step towards AI becoming a ubiquitous tool in our lives. Williams F1 presents the announcement, detailing how Claude will be used with the team.

🏈 North Dakota State paying up to move up from FCS to the top half of Division I In this era of college sports, most schools are tightening their belts around spending. With the increased expenditures required to run college sports, even powerhouse schools feel the strain of the higher costs. NDSU is doing the opposite. The FCS titans are paying a total of $15 million to move to the Mountain West Conference in football only. It’s a move made possible by conference realignment in the Pac-12 and Mountain West. The Bison are the most decorated FCS team in FCS history and have claimed 10 national championships since 2011. Even though they aren’t the first FCS school to make the leap, their move has unique significance. For starters, none of the other programs that have made the jump have come anywhere close to NDSU's success in FCS. And second, the NCAA significantly increased the FBS reclassification fee from only $5,000 to $5 million as of late 2023. It’s a move that adds a massive upfront investment to their bottom line. But they are banking on more national exposure and future College Football hopes to make the move more than worth it. Read more about how conference realignment moves made within the Mountain West made the leap possible for NDSU.

💰 Kalshi says Super Bowl trading volume surpassed $1 billion It turns out the biggest winners from Super Bowl 60 weren’t the Seahawks. No offense to the Seahawks and the Lombardi trophy, but a 2,700% increase in trading volume from last year has greater lasting relevance for the prediction market behemoth. The data, summarized by CNBC, demonstrates just how mainstream prediction markets have become. Just a few years ago, Kalshi was grasping for dear life, fighting numerous court battles to prove its legitimacy. Now, it’s valued at about $11 billion and was driving more attention to its brand during the Super Bowl than any ad did. All without featuring an ad. Their rise isn’t without its hiccups. Kalshi is still fighting court battles in multiple states, like New York and Nevada. And they are trying to stay a step ahead of insider trading, which is always an inevitable risk in financial markets. For now, Kalshi will celebrate its monumental day, just without a trip to Disney World or a champagne bath.

🏦 SEC becomes first college league to distribute $1 billion Business is booming in the SEC. It went from an annual revenue of $527 million in 2015 — Greg Sankey’s first year as commissioner — to hitting the billion-dollar mark a decade later. Both the SEC and Big Ten are on pace to overtake the NCAA’s annual revenue numbers within the next couple of years. It’s interesting to think about what could happen once that happens. Already the two most powerful conferences in college by a long shot, how could the NCAA enforce rules on conferences that are more powerful than it is? As mentioned earlier in the Bediako case and in other NIL-era cases, the NCAA already struggles to keep up with the massive changes sweeping through the college sports landscape. Billionaire and Texas Tech alum Cody Campbell has been making the case for replacing the NCAA with a new organization better equipped to address the changing landscape. Whether that happens or not, it will be tough for the NCAA to maintain control when multiple conferences begin outearning it in revenue. Yahoo Sports relays how the SEC became the first billion-dollar college conference.