Motionographer® NCAA’s Draw the Line

Blaming athletes for a loss has always been part of sports. What’s changed is how easy it is to act on it! Social media puts athletes a message away. Sports betting puts money on the line. And when wagers don’t land, frustration can quickly turn into harassment directed at student-athletes themselves.

That tension is at the center of Draw the Line, the NCAA’s returning campaign focused on the growing wave of online abuse toward college athletes. Launching during the 2026 Division I Men’s and Women’s Basketball Championships alongside Problem Gambling Awareness Month, the work challenges fans to reconsider where passion crosses into harm.

This year, the NCAA and Indianapolis-based creative agency The Basement approached that message with a new creative solution: animation.

Rather than relying on gameplay footage or athlete likeness, The Basement proposed a fully animated approach, developed in partnership with motion design studio Fern, to visualize a problem that often exists off the court and behind screens. The medium allows the campaign to depict the emotional impact of harassment in a way that traditional highlight-driven creative cannot.

Animation became a strategic unlock, not just a stylistic choice. It gave the NCAA a way to show the unseen, DMs, digital pile-ons, and the mental toll of online abuse, while maintaining flexibility across platforms and avoiding the constraints tied to real footage.

Credits:

Client: NCAA
Agency: The Basement
ACD: Michael Thaman
ACD/Writer: Burton Runyan
Senior Project Manager: Kaylee Showers

Production: Fern
ECD: James Mabery
CD: Alexandra Badiu
EP: Caroline Lobo
Lead Animator: Quincy Baltes
Illustrator: Alexandra Badiu, Alexandra Francis, Quincy Baltes, Dennis Wardzala, Jackie Nguyen, Kate Caillet
Animators: James Mabery, Quincy Baltes, Drew Jackson, Saki Tanaka, Bruno de Mendonca, Dennis Wardzala, Josh Trotter, Taka Yuki

Music/Sound Design: The Chicken
Voice Over: Tyson Kuteyi