Essentially donating to a university directly goes to improving staff resources and other things internally. At this point I'd struggle to see what that'd be for hoops, outside of a practice facility that'd cost hundreds of millions to build at this point.
NIL goes to the players, and makes a school more attractive to top prospects. Football and men's basketball have already put out top 15-20 classes the last two years via the portal and been able to improve their teams drastically.
For the time being, NIL will be critical to fielding a good squad. Maybe less so in non-revenue sports, but women's basketball is probably going to be moving toward a better spot soon.
Coaches can't talk about NIL too much, but it is their number one priority from their fans.
Cal Legends is doing an NIL drive for all three sports right now. Football and Men's basketball are over half a million, but I'm sure the women need some assistance here.
Here's the link for the women's drive:
http://spot.fund/bnjhdsc