Hanna and Haley Cavinder (The Cavinder Twins) on Signing With WWE's NIL Program

By Connor Casey

Hanna and Haley Cavinder (aka The Cavinder Twins) were announced as part of the first class of WWE's Next in Line program earlier this month. The program was recently introduced as WWE's way of recruiting collegiate athletes into becoming future WWE stars, allowing them to use the resources provided by the WWE Performance Center while still in school. The pair play women's basketball at Fresno State University but are also well-known on TikTok for having 3.8 million followers. 

The sisters spoke with TIME this week about the decision, openly admitting they never grew up thinking about becoming pro wrestlers but are interested in doing it as a side project. 

"We definitely didn't grow up wanting to become wrestlers," Haley said. "It just kind of happened. It's right up our alley because it is entertainment. And that's what Hanna and I do on the side."

"I don't think there's any concern. It's just entertainment. We love connecting with our fans and bringing our audience to their audience and meshing them all together," Hanna later added.

Triple H (real name Paul Levesque) also commented in the article — "I've heard it so much over the years ... 'if there had been a pathway, man, I would have gone down that road,'" he said. "We're creating that path."

"In today's world, somebody like the Cavinder twins who are already out there showing that they are pretty much larger than life and creating brands on their own, those are people that are interesting to us," he later said. "They clearly have the personality and clearly are smart enough to figure out how to manipulate that charisma to make something of themselves. We can amplify that."

The full list of signees from WWE's first Next in Line class includes: 

  • Carlos Aviles, of Ventura, Calif., a 6-foot-6, 305-pound track & field athlete from Ohio State University
  • Haley Cavinder, of Gilbert, Ariz., a 5-foot-6 basketball player from Fresno State University
  • Hanna Cavinder, of Gilbert, Ariz., a 5-foot-6 basketball player from Fresno State University
  • A.J. Ferrari of Dallas, Texas, a 6-foot, 200-pound wrestler from Oklahoma State University
  • Lexi Gordon of Fort Worth, Texas, a 6-foot basketball player from Duke University
  • Aleeya Hutchins of Toronto, Canada, a 5-foot-5 track & field athlete from Wake Forest University
  • John Krahn of Riverside, Calif., a 7-foot, 400-pound football player from Portland State University
  • Glen Logan of Kenner, La., a 6-foot-5, 305-pound football player from LSU
  • Isaac Odugbesan of Lagos, Nigeria, a 6-foot-4, 275-pound football player from the University of Alabama
  • Mason Parris of Lawrenceburg, Ind., a 6-foot-2, 275-pound wrestler from the University of Michigan
  • Masai Russel of Potomac, Md., a 5-foot-5 track & field athlete from the University of Kentucky
  • Jon Seaton of Hillsborough, N.J., a 6-foot-1, 285-pound football player from Elon University
  • Joe Spivak of Lombard, Ill., a 6-foot, 300-pound football player from Northwestern University
  • Dalton Wagner of Spring Grove, Ill., a 6-foot-9, 330-pound football player from the University of Arkansas
  • Riley White of Hoover, Ala., a 5-foot-6 track & field athlete from the University of Alabama
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