Richest Programs MN #26

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Okay, just to make sure I'm understanding this correctly:

The Gopher football program makes more in revenue than the following schools: UCLA, USC, Stanford, North Carolina, Oklahoma State, Miami and Clemson?

Interesting.
 


MRJ said:
Okay, just to make sure I'm understanding this correctly:

The Gopher football program makes more in revenue than the following schools: UCLA, USC, Stanford, North Carolina, Oklahoma State, Miami and Clemson?

Interesting.
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It’s the whole athletic department.
 



And just think the B1G passed up millions of dollars this football season because they didn’t follow other conferences and allow 5 to 10 thousand fans per game. Should cost Kevin Warren his job.
 

Plato said:
That is why the BTN was a game changer for the better for FB programs with relatively low ticket sales.
All of the BIG teams can compete nationally for coaches, recruiting costs and facilities.
That is why NE "Lowered their standards" and agreed to join the BIG.
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I admit I was a skeptic. "Who's gonna watch a whole network about the Big Ten when half the year nothing's happening, football only happens on 12 Saturday afternoons, and most of the best games are on the major networks. Can we keep this thing afloat on Ro-Tel Chili ads?"

That part at face value turned out to be true. But as we now know, it's not about the ratings.

Turns out the powers that be were savvy enough to realize that in the 2010s and beyond, live sports were the only thing holding a lot of people to their cable packages, and Big Ten fans were willing to wage holy war with their cable company so they wouldn't miss Minnesota vs Florida Atlantic or Ohio State vs Youngstown State
 

Unlike basketball where March Madness goes thru and is funneled away by the NCAA, College Football money goes to conferences and schools. Which is why the Big Ten should never agree to a united College Football Program. The BTN makes them more money and the Rose Bowl, at least in off years, makes them more and garners bigger ratings too.

Unless there's gonna be a draft and schools all have the same entrance standards things won't ever be "equal" in College Football or sports.

The South and West already have a lot of advantages and they've got all the desirable bowl games too.

Why fans of the Big Ten want to give-up their advantage so people can ignore the regular season and just focus on the playoffs is..ill advised.
 
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Minnesota isn't rich. The Big Ten is rich.
 



MRJ said:
Okay, just to make sure I'm understanding this correctly:

The Gopher football program makes more in revenue than the following schools: UCLA, USC, Stanford, North Carolina, Oklahoma State, Miami and Clemson?

Interesting.
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This is why Jim Delaney was probably the single best hire the B1G has ever made. People complained every step of the way (myself included), but his team was responsible for all of that money.

Really hope Warren can live up to half of that performance, but we won't know for 10 years.
 

MplsGopher said:
Minnesota isn't rich. The Big Ten is rich.
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If you just auctioned off Minnesota's athletic department it would be worth somewhere between $500-800M. They are absolutely rich, because of their affiliation with the B1G.
 

hello-world said:
If you just auctioned off Minnesota's athletic department it would be worth somewhere between $500-800M. They are absolutely rich, because of their affiliation with the B1G.
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And often barely break even.
 

builtbadgers said:
And often barely break even.
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Because they are a non-profit. They aren't run like a business trying to spin out cash. They aren't supposed to do any better than breaking even or they would cut all the non-revenue sports. If they wanted to make money, they could make money, instead they spend it on women's hockey.
 



hello-world said:
Because they are a non-profit. They aren't run like a business trying to spin out cash. They aren't supposed to do any better than breaking even or they would cut all the non-revenue sports. If they wanted to make money, they could make money, instead they spend it on women's hockey.
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There are AD that make money. Look it up. Other schools that also have non revenue sports make a great deal more than we do.
 


hello-world said:
I have looked it up. There is literally no point in measuring profitability beyond breakeven for a non-profit. That isn't the goal.
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Athletic directors love making a profit, better facilities, better coaching staffs, better travel, larger recruiting budgets. Coyle would disagree with you.
 

builtbadgers said:
Athletic directors love making a profit, better facilities, better coaching staffs, better travel, larger recruiting budgets. Coyle would disagree with you.
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Right - it's technically a non-profit, but the more money the football team makes, the nicer toys you get to have.
 

Word said:
Right - it's technically a non-profit, but the more money the football team makes, the nicer toys you get to have.
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Barry Alvarez says the best advice he ever got was Pat Richter telling him to run it like a business.
 


hello-world said:
If you just auctioned off Minnesota's athletic department it would be worth somewhere between $500-800M. They are absolutely rich, because of their affiliation with the B1G.
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You are correct, in absolute terms. That's just another way to word what the OP already said. Compared to 99% of colleges and universities in the nation, indeed we have a lot of high-dollar assets to our name.

I'm simply saying that our richness, like the richness of every other major program in the country, is derived from the trainloads of TV $$$ that has started raining down the last 10-15 years.
 

builtbadgers said:
Athletic directors love making a profit, better facilities, better coaching staffs, better travel, larger recruiting budgets. Coyle would disagree with you.
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You are flat wrong. You don't know what you're talking about.

Revenue is what athletic depts/directors care about. There is no such thing as "profit" in college athletics.
 

Word said:
Right - it's technically a non-profit, but the more money the football team makes, the nicer toys you get to have.
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Thanks Big Ten! $50M+ a year, no matter how we perform by any metric.
 

MplsGopher said:
You are flat wrong. You don't know what you're talking about.

Revenue is what athletic depts/directors care about. There is no such thing as "profit" in college athletics.
[/QUOTE
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Sure, call it what you want. Alvarez, Jim Sterk, Carla Williams, Gregg Byme all seek higher revenue, a wider gap from expenses to have money left over for improvements. If you have ever attended a event for a fundraising drive you know how thrilled they are when they get gifts that amount to 10 million on the plus side of of all debts and service. Coaches and AD's we have represented know how important it is to have accounts that carry a positive balance. Texas AM is carrying hundreds of millions of dollars on the plus side. Only 12 % of schools are carrying a profit. The U would love to do better than to lose money or break even. Plenty of non profits in my home community have 100's of millions of dollars. They use it to improve facilities, hire better professionals. Label it whatever you want. Pat Richter said when he got the UW job (WHICH WAS DROWNING IN DEBT) That he was going to run it like OSCAR Meyer and make money. Calling something a non profit does not diminish their drive to make money.
 

builtbadgers said:
Sure, call it what you want. Alvarez, Jim Sterk, Carla Williams, Gregg Byme all seek higher revenue, a wider gap from expenses to have money left over for improvements. If you have ever attended a event for a fundraising drive you know how thrilled they are when they get gifts that amount to 10 million on the plus side of of all debts and service. Coaches and AD's we have represented know how important it is to have accounts that carry a positive balance. Texas AM is carrying hundreds of millions of dollars on the plus side. Only 12 % of schools are carrying a profit. The U would love to do better than to lose money or break even. Plenty of non profits in my home community have 100's of millions of dollars. They use it to improve facilities, hire better professionals. Label it whatever you want. Pat Richter said when he got the UW job (WHICH WAS DROWNING IN DEBT) That he was going to run it like OSCAR Meyer and make money. Calling something a non profit does not diminish their drive to make money.
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Everything you said about seeking higher revenue is just fine and correct.

Madison, A&M, nor any other (major) university athletic dept "carry" any "profit". There is no such thing. No more than schools "profit" off their student unions.

They do seek as much revenue as they can generate. That's fine.
 

MplsGopher said:
You are correct, in absolute terms. That's just another way to word what the OP already said. Compared to 99% of colleges and universities in the nation, indeed we have a lot of high-dollar assets to our name.

I'm simply saying that our richness, like the richness of every other major program in the country, is derived from the trainloads of TV $$$ that has started raining down the last 10-15 years.
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Where we get crushed is gifts, apparel contracts. Looks like the new SEC deal with ESPN will push those schools past the Big 10 deal. Some of these schools exceed us by more than 50 million a year just in gifts. It is and has been a arms race for a long time. The alarming thing for me is to know we are 9th in the conference. We have to do better.
 

builtbadgers said:
Where we get crushed is gifts, apparel contracts. Looks like the new SEC deal with ESPN will push those schools past the Big 10 deal. Some of these schools exceed us by more than 50 million a year just in gifts. It is and has been a arms race for a long time. The alarming thing for me is to know we are 9th in the conference. We have to do better.
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Texas A&M gets absurd levels of donations every year. Far more than Ohio State and I think every other school. Texas gets a lot too, but A&M far surpasses them. https://sports.usatoday.com/ncaa/finances

At some point, it saturates. You can't buy wins. T Boone tried, and failed.
 

As far as MN - the BTN money is great - but schools like MN still need to try and maximize their locally-generated revenue.

And that means ticket sales for Football, men's basketball and men's hockey.

it will be very interesting to see what happens with ticket sales coming out of covid. (assuming that we get back to something approximating "normal" by the Fall.)

will fans return as the same levels as before - at greater levels - or at lower levels?

did covid make fans appreciate the experience of attending games in person, or did covid make fans realize they can follow teams just as well sitting on the couch with a 65" flat-screen?

will schools make adjustments in ticket prices and seating "donations" as an incentive for fans to return? (an empty seat generates no revenue....)

I suspect that MN is going to have to work really hard on marketing and promotions to just get attendance back to pre-covid levels. beyond that, the teams will have to win and win big to get the casual fans back in attendance.
 

MplsGopher said:
Texas A&M gets absurd levels of donations every year. Far more than Ohio State and I think every other school. Texas gets a lot too, but A&M far surpasses them. https://sports.usatoday.com/ncaa/finances

At some point, it saturates. You can't buy wins. T Boone tried, and failed.
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Exactly. If you do not hire the right coach than all that money will not win it all. You are able to win more recruiting battles with better facilities but all the top programs have great facilities. Maybe A-M has hired the right coaches. We will fin out soon enough. They still can not equal brand name like Alabama, Clemson, Ohio State.
 

short ornery norwegian said:
As far as MN - the BTN money is great - but schools like MN still need to try and maximize their locally-generated revenue.

And that means ticket sales for Football, men's basketball and men's hockey.

it will be very interesting to see what happens with ticket sales coming out of covid. (assuming that we get back to something approximating "normal" by the Fall.)

will fans return as the same levels as before - at greater levels - or at lower levels?

did covid make fans appreciate the experience of attending games in person, or did covid make fans realize they can follow teams just as well sitting on the couch with a 65" flat-screen?

will schools make adjustments in ticket prices and seating "donations" as an incentive for fans to return? (an empty seat generates no revenue....)

I suspect that MN is going to have to work really hard on marketing and promotions to just get attendance back to pre-covid levels. beyond that, the teams will have to win and win big to get the casual fans back in attendance.
Click to expand...
All things equal, I don't think a lot will change with fans. Those who regularly attended will start to again. Those who did so casually, will do so again. How often the casual fan attends depends on the product (wins).
 

short ornery norwegian said:
As far as MN - the BTN money is great - but schools like MN still need to try and maximize their locally-generated revenue.

And that means ticket sales for Football, men's basketball and men's hockey.

it will be very interesting to see what happens with ticket sales coming out of covid. (assuming that we get back to something approximating "normal" by the Fall.)

will fans return as the same levels as before - at greater levels - or at lower levels?

did covid make fans appreciate the experience of attending games in person, or did covid make fans realize they can follow teams just as well sitting on the couch with a 65" flat-screen?

will schools make adjustments in ticket prices and seating "donations" as an incentive for fans to return? (an empty seat generates no revenue....)

I suspect that MN is going to have to work really hard on marketing and promotions to just get attendance back to pre-covid levels. beyond that, the teams will have to win and win big to get the casual fans back in attendance.
Click to expand...
Great post and we had already been low on the attendance scale.
 

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