NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WTVF — On the surface there’s never been a better time to be a college student-athlete. Players get full scholarships, can now make money through NIL and many will soon get paid to play by their schools. But that leaves schools trying to figure out where that money will come from, and for many it will lead them towards a financial breaking point.
Collegiate athletics generates nearly $14 billion in revenue per year. That money then covers the cost of salaries, facilities, travel and the sponsorship of anywhere from 14 to 36 sports at division one universities.
Now, according to the revenue sharing details filed in the settlement of House V. National Collegiate Athletic Association last month, NCAA member schools will be able to use 22 percent of their yearly budget to pay their players directly. A cost that will take a toll on the biggest athletic departments in the country and could cripple the ones already struggling financially.
“If it continues to become more and more incoherent there may be a breaking point at some point for all of us,” Belmont University President Dr. Gregory L. Jones said about the new financial stresses on the 364 division one programs.
Under the new revenue sharing model the “salary cap” set for the 2025-26 school year will be approximately $23.1 million, giving athletes close to a 50 percent share in total revenue when you factor in scholarships and other benefits.
Considering just 28 division one athletic departments turned a profit during the 2021-22 school year, it is a concern for athletic directors across the nation.
“How do you fund this additional money knowing that the pot didn’t get any bigger?” Vanderbilt Athletic Director Candice Storey Lee asked. “Some people have come out publicly and talked about cutting sports or minimizing opportunities. I don’t think people fully appreciate when they hear about all the big dollars coming in that this is used to fund all the experiences for all the student-athletes.”
SEC schools like Vanderbilt will benefit from a new tv contract with ESPN that’s projected to pay out as much as $75 million per school in 2025. But what about those schools struggling to keep up with the cash-rich SEC and Big 10?
Each school, and perhaps each program, will have to figure out their funding priorities.
“I think it could lead to a radical realignment of sports, travel and opportunities,” Jones said. “I think there’s going to be more differentiation between sports and between universities in the kinds of resources they’re going to devote. Quite frankly, I think even within conferences, the flagship state university has resources private universities don’t have. So for Vanderbilt to try to function in the SEC or Duke in the ACC or Northwestern in the Big 10, it’s going to get increasingly challenging.
In an effort to give schools more flexibility in how they choose to fund their various programs moving forward, the NCAA outlined one other major change in the House settlement. Beginning next year sports will no longer have scholarship limits. Instead, they will move to a roster size limit.
Football rosters will now be capped at 105 players – each able to receive a full scholarship. That’s a potential increase of 20 scholarship players from the current limit of 85, but also will cap rosters at lower number than what many coaches prefer to carry and could drastically reduce the number of walk-on players in division one football.
Men’s basketball will now match women’s basketball with a 15-player roster. Previously, men’s teams were capped at 13 scholarships while women’s teams had 15. Both could have unlimited numbers of walk-ons.
Football and basketball have always been considered fully funded sports by the NCAA, but many sports, even at the division one level, are considered equivalency sports. Those sports – often men’s - have had limited scholarship numbers to help schools save money and maintain Title IX compliance given the size of their football roster. Those limits are also going away.
For example, baseball currently operates with 11.7 scholarships, spreading that money around to 30-35 players. Men’s tennis has 3.75 scholarships for teams that are often as big as 12. Moving forward, baseball will have a 34-player roster limit and both men’s and women’s tennis teams will have roster limits of 10. Schools will now be able to fund all or, potentially, none of those spots with scholarships.
In all 790 scholarship opportunities will be created across the NCAA’s 40 sports. But with no requirement to fund roster spot, and the need to invest more in football and basketball to remain competitive, the fear is that scholarships, jobs and even entire sports will be cut.
“That is a train wreck that is waiting to happen,” Middle Tennessee State University President Dr. Sidney McPhee said. “How we manage that is going to be critical for the future of collegiate athletics. How do you balance that out with respect to those athletes that are just as important, but they’re not generating that kind of dollars.”
The growing financial divide between the haves and have nots in college sports have some wondering if the most powerful schools may soon break away and form their own top division.
But even amidst the turmoil division one membership has grown to 364 institutions, seeking the prestige and the access to lucrative national championships like the men’s basketball tournament. The financial benefit and the exposure of participating in those events can be vital to the health of their athletic department and university as a whole.
“I really attribute Belmont’s sort of meteoric rise over the last 25 years in significant part to the decision to go division one in athletics,” Jones said. “And to be successful, it elevates the brand.”
Belmont’s rise includes nine trips to the NCAA Tournament and a climb from division one independent to the ASUN Conference, the Ohio Valley Conference and then in 2022 a spot in the Missouri Valley Conference, one of the nation’s premier mid-major basketball leagues. Meanwhile, the school’s enrollment has more than doubled over that same period.
And it’s not just Belmont. Schools like Gonzaga, Davidson, George Mason, Butler and Loyola University of Chicago have all gotten major boosts athletically and as institutions thanks to NCAA Tournament runs that helped put them on the national map.
“Let Ohio State be Ohio State,” Middle Tennessee Athletic Director Chris Massaro said. “We’ve never really tried to compete with them financially anyhow. Now we still want access to the championships. You know, David wants that rock because you can kill Goliath. And we’ve done that, you know? We beat Michigan State.”
In 2016, Middle Tennessee stunned national title favorite Michigan State in the NCAA Tournament’s first round. It was one of the 11 instances where a no. 15 seed has upset a no. 2 seed in the history of the tournament. A great moment for the Blue Raiders, and the type of madness that has made the NCAA Tournament a national phenomenon.
And it is those moments in March and beyond, and the desire to preserve them, that ties every NCAA school together for now.
“Will it hold us together?” McPhee asked following the House settlement. “Will those institutions that have the ability to generate millions and millions and millions of dollars understand that other institutions are not in that position and how do we make it whole so we all live together and don’t cannibalize each other?”
