Good morning and welcome back to the Tip Sheet, a weekly newsletter from Tom Dudchik’s Capitol Report written by Mike Cerulli.

This week, we’re dipping back into some 2028 speculation. Plus, Ned Lamont wants to buy a slice for Dave Portnoy. Is the Barstool vote up for grabs? Finally, we'll break down some news in the college basketball world.

Let’s dive in…

Hayes: “I’d be a great senator”

Jahana Hayes told News 8’s Dennis House that she’s squarely focused on helping her party win back control of the U.S. House this year. But she also declared that she believes she’d be a great senator – a statement that is certain to throw more fuel on the speculative fire surrounding Dick Blumenthal’s plans for 2028.

Hayes’ name has long been tossed around by those theorizing about the list of potential Blumenthal successors. It’s a list that also includes William Tong and Jim Himes. In the aftermath of John Larson’s resounding primary defeat, speculation about the Senate race in 2028 has grown more serious. Casual conjecture has turned into more concrete discussions of how it all might play out if Blumenthal steps aside or soldiers on seeking another term.

For her part, Hayes was clear that she doesn’t view age alone as a disqualifying factor. She also declined to directly answer House when he asked if she would be interested in running for Blumenthal’s seat. The Waterbury native is currently running in two very different races – one for re-election and another for the chairmanship of the committee overseeing education and labor policy. Cook Political Report rates Hayes’ race against Republican Chris Shay as ‘Solid Democrat.’

“I’m humbled by the fact that I’m even a member of Congress,” Hayes said.

“I’m not title shopping,” Hayes added. “I joke about the House and the Senate being the difference between public school and private school. And I’m definitely a public school girl.”

Toward the end of her exchange with House, Hayes made a point of throwing in that declarative line about a possible Senate run.

“We’ve got tremendous people in the state,” she said. “Tremendous candidates, tremendous quality. So, we have to really start just looking at experience and impact in a very different way. But I also think I’d be a great senator.”

“There you go!” House exclaimed.

You can watch the full interview here.

Lamont tells Portnoy to pull up

Early in the Trump era, the term “Barstool conservative” was coined to describe a distinct sect of the American body politic that sits at some undefined point in between traditional social conservatives, libertarians, and coastal liberals. The Barstool conservatives are, at least according to various thinkpiece writers who’ve taken a stab at describing them, the frat bros who scoff at Instagram activism while opposing strict abortion bans and generally recoiling at any attempts to box them into a partisan political identity. They are many of the young men who helped deliver Donald Trump’s victory in 2024 but now have reservations about a host of the president’s most polarizing policies. That apparent fickleness makes the Barstool crowd a potentially crucial segment of swing voters.

If there is such a thing as a Barstool liberal, Ned Lamont might be attempting to become one of them. The governor recently made a direct appeal to Barstool Sports founder Dave Portnoy, promising pizza to the infamous internet pugilist if he shows up to the UConn-UMass bout in two weeks.

“What if I said I wanted to bring the Barstool College football to beautiful Hartford for Umass vs Uconn in a few weeks,” Portnoy tweeted.

“Come on down, Dave,” Lamont’s official account replied. “You bring Barstool, we’ll bring the pizza.”

In a sense, Lamont’s offer can be viewed as an overdue tribute to the man who, perhaps more than anyone else, helped craft Connecticut’s pizza-centric state identity. Portnoy famously told his legions of loyal online followers that the Nutmeg State is the nation’s “pizza capital.” Certainly, the quality of Connecticut’s pizza is owed entirely to the hardworking restaurateurs who’ve toiled for generations to perfect their craft. But it was Portnoy who put the word “a-beetz” on the tongues of pizza lovers across the globe.

On the other hand, Lamont’s outreach to Portnoy has sparked some quiet grumblings among members of the Democratic coalition in Connecticut. Portnoy’s history of controversy does not sit well with many of the progressives who view Barstool as the pop cultural manifestation of everything wrong with young men in America.

If both gubernatorial candidates show up, the UConn-UMass game might be a venue for a real-time focus group of how the Barstool boys view Lamont and Ryan Fazio, who just so happens to be a former president of SigEp at Northwestern. Will they get a warm reception? Or will they be told to "relax, pal" and keep politics away from the tailgate? Game day awaits.

UConn newest basketball sponsor? UConn Health

The flood of cash into the college sports world has extended onto the uniforms of student athletes – including the men and women of UConn’s dominant basketball programs.

UConn’s athletic department on Friday announced that UConn Health had been selected to furnish a logo stitched onto the left shoulder of players’ jerseys.

UConn's athletic department framed the deal as an exciting expansion of the longstanding partnership with between the school and its affiliated hospital system. To the taxpaying layman, the whole thing may seem like one branch of the UConn ecosystem lining another’s pockets while both receive substantial subsidies from the state government.

The NCAA began allowing schools to sell the jersey patch sponsorships this year. UConn and Kansas appear to be the first of the blue bloods to jump into the fray. The Jayhawks announced their deal with the cryptocurrency firm Ripple over the summer. 

In the Big East, the Providence Friars picked Santander Bank as their inaugural patch sponsor. DePaul is partnering with Desert Cactus, a firm specializing in licensed merchandise. Among power conference schools, public reporting indicates jersey patch sponsorship deals – which typically cover all of a school’s sports – can yield millions annually. Ohio State’s deal with JP Morgan Chase, which includes other sponsorship opportunities for athletes, is reportedly worth $17 million per year.

The flowery press release accompanying the rollout of the deal between two UConn entities did not disclose financial terms nor whether any other potential advertisers had competed as part of a bidding process. 

That’s all for this week. We’ll be back next week with another edition of the Tip Sheet!