STrib: Gophers athletic department to present budget-cutting ideas to regents

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per Megan:

The Gophers athletic department has already lost $4 million in the fallout from the coronavirus pandemic with estimates of losses ultimately reaching as high as $75 million. Now it has to present its plan to navigate those potentially extreme losses to the Board of Regents.

The Board released docket materials for the Friday presentation showing how the athletic department went from forecasting a $1 million revenue surplus in February after successful fundraising efforts and a fruitful football season to losing $4 million by April from canceled facilities rentals and a sharp drop in NCAA distributions, down to $225 million across Division I schools from a projected $600 million.

While the department is saving some money during this time of canceled sports from travel, recruiting and event hosting, the department still will need to work toward a balanced $123 million budget this year. Hiring and spending freezes, reduction in summer school expenses as well as voluntary salary reductions for head coaches and senior staff are all occurring.

The athletic department has not released pay cut specifics, but football coach P.J. Fleck, men's basketball coach Richard Pitino and women's basketball coach Lindsay Whalen all took one-week pay cuts. Per contracts, Fleck was set to earn $4.6 million this year, making his weekly salary about $88,462. Pitino makes $2.4 million annually, putting him about $46,154 per week. And Whalen is making $496,500, putting her at $9,548 per week.

Athletic director Mark Coyle, who will present these strategies to the Board, and others in the athletic department also have taken pay cuts.

www.startribune.com

Gophers athletic department to present budget-cutting ideas to regents

The pandemic is putting U athletic department in a financial pinch.
www.startribune.com www.startribune.com

Go Gophers!!
 

Been thinking about whether to renew or not for this season.

At the start of this I didn't know financially.

Right now I think the Billds are in for our normal two.

I deeply appreciate the U and especially the AD giving us some breathing room to decide. It made a difference for us.
 

Also waiting for the new deadline, but plan is to increase to 8 tickets from our historical 6!
 


I don't see what they're realistically going to be able to propose, to make cuts that move the needle.

The athletic dept itself I'm guessing doesn't employ a ton of staff outside of coaching staff (including strength and condition in coaching staff).

So I'm not sure hiring freezes, pay cuts, and/or furloughs does much there. Half a million to a million, maybe? That barely moves the needle if you're talking about losing $30M in revenue.


You'd have to talk about cutting sports. I don't see any way around it.

To me, you'd have to start with cuts to Olympic sports that don't bring in revenue and don't really "do much" for the athletic program.

In my opinion, that starts with gymnastics and golf. Could look at tennis too, but then that means the tennis facilities go to waste. Similar with cutting swimming. You've got a whole huge aquatic center that would be going to waste. Rowing? You probably need for Title IX to balance out football.

Doesn't to seem to be many realistic options here either. And how much money would cutting those sports really save anyway?
 


Hard to imagine how much fat in that budget, considering the meteoric rise in revenue over the last 10-15 years. If fall and winter revenue sports happen in some way, shape, or form (preserving that tv stream) which they can and should the department will survive with some temporary belt tightening and contract renegotiations, like most other people out there.
 

Pompous Elitist said:
Hard to imagine how much fat in that budget, considering the meteoric rise in revenue over the last 10-15 years. If fall and winter revenue sports happen in some way, shape, or form (preserving that tv stream) which they can and should the department will survive with some temporary belt tightening and contract renegotiations, like most other people out there.
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I agree 100%, and I think this is a likely outcome. Let's hope so
 

Cutting any sports should be a last resort. Future scheduling changes in the non revenue sports could be a good first step. Play more regionalized non conference teams rather than traveling all over the country. Iowa State, Kansas, Kansas St, Notre Dame , Marquette, SDSU, North Dakota, Missouri and others should be on as many schedules as possible for as many sports as possible. Just show prudence in scheduling, reduce athletic perks by 20% and carry on.
 




I'm guessing cutting ticket prices isn't at the top of their list right now.
 

Just for the heck of it, I went on the U of MN website and tried to count the number of Athletic Department Employees. Came up with this: (there is some duplication, so I might have counted the same person twice in a couple of categories....the list includes interns)
Athletic Administration - 19 employees
Business - 7
Communications - 11
Compliance - 7
Equipment - 9
Event Management - 4
Facilities - 28
Marketing - 6
Digital - 17
Golden Gopher Fund - 13
Gopher Sports Properties - 12
Athletic Human resources - 3
Information Technology - 5
Academic Counseling - 19
Athletic Medicine - 22
Athletic Nutrition - 2
Ticket Sales & Service - 14
Athletic performance - 16
Student-Athlete Development - 2

And that does not include the coaching staff and support staff people for each sport.
Football alone has 32 people listed.

No offense meant to any of the employees, but - to grab one title out of the list - I bet the U - if they had to - could get along without the "Communications Assistant for Women's Gymnastics and Rowing."
 

short ornery norwegian said:
And that does not include the coaching staff and support staff people for each sport.
Football alone has 32 people listed.

No offense meant to any of the employees, but - to grab one title out of the list - I bet the U - if they had to - could get along without the "Communications Assistant for Women's Gymnastics and Rowing."
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In the grand scheme of their budget though, that person makes a drop in the bucket. PJ and Pitino dwarf all the other coaches in pay. The only substantial salary cuts would have to come from them.
 

Word said:
In the grand scheme of their budget though, that person makes a drop in the bucket. PJ and Pitino dwarf all the other coaches in pay. The only substantial salary cuts would have to come from them.
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I'd tend to agree, cutting the lowest paid employees is gonna do far less (unless you cut a significant amount) then cutting the salary of the highest paid employees. In the end, it'll probably be a combination of both.
 



If the U wants to generate more income they should finally finish Norwood’s pricing plan. Once the games are back - BAM, instant revenue adjustment.
 

short ornery norwegian said:
No offense meant to any of the employees, but - to grab one title out of the list - I bet the U - if they had to - could get along without the "Communications Assistant for Women's Gymnastics and Rowing."
Click to expand...

That position is an internship, as shown here. Letting her go should save the department.
 

Spoofin said:
If the U wants to generate more income they should finally finish Norwood’s pricing plan. Once the games are back - BAM, instant revenue adjustment.
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Wonder if they've thought about selling the heating Coyles?
 

Spoofin said:
If the U wants to generate more income they should finally finish Norwood’s pricing plan. Once the games are back - BAM, instant revenue adjustment.
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That sounds like a gold-plated data driven, intellectually disruptive, blue ocean, lean, agile, responsive chief executive level action item. This time we’re going be belts and suspenders before we drop a bag of snakes.
 

short ornery norwegian said:
Just for the heck of it, I went on the U of MN website and tried to count the number of Athletic Department Employees. Came up with this: (there is some duplication, so I might have counted the same person twice in a couple of categories....the list includes interns)
Athletic Administration - 19 employees
Business - 7
Communications - 11
Compliance - 7
Equipment - 9
Event Management - 4
Facilities - 28
Marketing - 6
Digital - 17
Golden Gopher Fund - 13
Gopher Sports Properties - 12
Athletic Human resources - 3
Information Technology - 5
Academic Counseling - 19
Athletic Medicine - 22
Athletic Nutrition - 2
Ticket Sales & Service - 14
Athletic performance - 16
Student-Athlete Development - 2

And that does not include the coaching staff and support staff people for each sport.
Football alone has 32 people listed.

No offense meant to any of the employees, but - to grab one title out of the list - I bet the U - if they had to - could get along without the "Communications Assistant for Women's Gymnastics and Rowing."
Click to expand...

Hard to say if they’re over staffed. I’m a bit surprised they have their own IT staff and so many communications, marketing, digital but I’m far from educated on the department’s requirements or ROI there.

The real fat is probably in the inflated salaries and benefits up and down the list. They can afford a paycut, including our boy in 2020.
 

I’ve always been mystified why every scholarship in hockey, baseball and basketball have not been supported by an endowment named after Gopher greats. The total scholarships is under 45.

Any half decent fundraiser could raise big dough on behalf of each of the hockey greats John Mayasich, Lou Nanne, Neal Broten, Herb Brooks, Robb Stauber, Jordan Leopold, Paul Martin, etc.
 

GoldMedalCounty said:
I’ve always been mystified why every scholarship in hockey, baseball and basketball have not been supported by an endowment named after Gopher greats. The total scholarships is under 45.

Any half decent fundraiser could raise big dough on behalf of each of the hockey greats John Mayasich, Lou Nanne, Neal Broten, Herb Brooks, Robb Stauber, Jordan Leopold, Paul Martin, etc.
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It's tough to say what is the actual annual cost of each athletic scholarship, but using this table: https://admissions.tc.umn.edu/costsaid/tuition.html, let's say $35,000 per athlete (which is probably light considering the housing, food, clothing and support services athletes receive). In order to fully support a distribution of $35,000 each year, each scholarship would have to be endowed at a total of $777,777. In other words, you would need approximately $35M in investable assets to support 45 scholarships. I would love to see you raise $35M - after all, it's so easy.
 

dpodoll68 said:
It's tough to say what is the actual annual cost of each athletic scholarship, but using this table: https://admissions.tc.umn.edu/costsaid/tuition.html, let's say $35,000 per athlete (which is probably light considering the housing, food, clothing and support services athletes receive). In order to fully support a distribution of $35,000 each year, each scholarship would have to be endowed at a total of $777,777. In other words, you would need approximately $35M in investable assets to support 45 scholarships. I would love to see you raise $35M - after all, it's so easy.
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I don’t think people know what an endowment is when they suggest stuff like this
 

short ornery norwegian said:
Just for the heck of it, I went on the U of MN website and tried to count the number of Athletic Department Employees. Came up with this: (there is some duplication, so I might have counted the same person twice in a couple of categories....the list includes interns)
Athletic Administration - 19 employees
Business - 7
Communications - 11
Compliance - 7
Equipment - 9
Event Management - 4
Facilities - 28
Marketing - 6
Digital - 17
Golden Gopher Fund - 13
Gopher Sports Properties - 12
Athletic Human resources - 3
Information Technology - 5
Academic Counseling - 19
Athletic Medicine - 22
Athletic Nutrition - 2
Ticket Sales & Service - 14
Athletic performance - 16
Student-Athlete Development - 2

And that does not include the coaching staff and support staff people for each sport.
Football alone has 32 people listed.

No offense meant to any of the employees, but - to grab one title out of the list - I bet the U - if they had to - could get along without the "Communications Assistant for Women's Gymnastics and Rowing."
Click to expand...
Even if there's no duplication and the average employee on the list makes $50,000 a year, they'd need to cut 40% of those people without losing any revenue to make up the $4 million. There is duplication and $50,000 is likely high with the list including interns.

Ticket sales and services would be cut significantly if there were no fans for fall sports. Same with event management if there are no/fewer events. Some areas could be cut back a little bit with a small impact but without causing major problems, such as athletic performance, athletic medicine, academic counseling, and facilities. Administration and support areas like HR and IT could be cut back if the athletics department is doing less and has fewer employees. 40% seems unreasonable.

If it's just the $4 million they can likely find things here to cut. Student-athlete and fan experience would get a bit worse and they would have trouble hiring people back when they were ready but they could probably make it work. If they lose fans for a football home game or two, that would be a lot harder. If they can't play football in the 2020-21 academic year or even if they play without fans, there won't be a good way to balance the budget. I think the only options would be to cut sports or to run a deficit and get the U or taxpayers to cover finances. Even then, I'm guessing there would be some long-term cuts and an expectation that the athletic department is profitable and returns some of the profit back to the U in the future.
 

dpodoll68 said:
It's tough to say what is the actual annual cost of each athletic scholarship, but using this table: https://admissions.tc.umn.edu/costsaid/tuition.html, let's say $35,000 per athlete (which is probably light considering the housing, food, clothing and support services athletes receive). In order to fully support a distribution of $35,000 each year, each scholarship would have to be endowed at a total of $777,777. In other words, you would need approximately $35M in investable assets to support 45 scholarships. I would love to see you raise $35M - after all, it's so easy.
Click to expand...
I used similar estimates and while I never said it would be easy to do overnight, I stand by my assertion that it’s mystifying. It simply must not be a priority if the hockey team hasn’t done so yet. The hockey program has extremely wealthy supporters and alumni, and Lou Nanne as a great ambassador in their back pocket. While there may have been a capital campaign for facilities that got in the way at times, raising money for the hockey team would be one of the easiest fundraising jobs in the state.
 

GoldMedalCounty said:
I used similar estimates and while I never said it would be easy to do overnight, I stand by my assertion that it’s mystifying. It simply must not be a priority if the hockey team hasn’t done so yet. The hockey program has extremely wealthy supporters and alumni, and Lou Nanne as a great ambassador in their back pocket. While there may have been a capital campaign for facilities that got in the way at times, raising money for the hockey team would be one of the easiest fundraising jobs in the state.
Click to expand...

It simply is not one of the easiest fundraising jobs in the state. It is hard to raise money.

Louie is a great ambassador, but still, he could get his buddy from 3M to pony up less than $1m per year in naming rights to the entire arena. So, how do you suppose they are going to raise $35m in named scholarships and locker rooms that no one ever hears about?
 
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