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UT Athletics: Recession Proof?

Posted by srr50 on February 12th, 2009 under Uncategorized

These economic times are tough, and college athletic programs are not immune to the downturn of the nation’s economy. For instance, a few weeks back, Stanford announced that it expects to lose $5 million over the next few years.

Meanwhile. down in Florida, Miami is cutting back on travel, taking buses to in-state games, and plans to try and boost attendance by cutting ticket prices.

Even the traditional powers are feeling the economic pinch. Ohio State announced that they will probably lose money this year.

Like a lot of corporations, major college athletic programs are finding out that over expansion may have helped lead to the financial crunch they are facing today.

For instance, The Stanford Athletic Department sponsors 35 varsity athletic programs. For those 35 sports, there are 444 males and 374 females participating in varsity sports on campus. That 818 varsity athletes out of an undergraduate enrollment of 6,579.


12% of the undergraduate population participates in varsity athletics at Stanford.

All Universities file annual reports on athletic participation as well as revenue and expenses for college athletics. These reports are available on the the equity in athletics website.

The reports, while perhaps not exactly accurate to the dollar, do reflect the basic flow of revenues and expenses. There are two major streams of revenue: football and donations, (or funds not allocated by gender/sport).

Stanford has won the Director’s Cup for best overall athletic program 14 years running. It had 47 students and alumni competing in the Beijing Olympics, bringing home eight gold medals, 12 silvers and four bronzes. But there is a price to pay for having such an expansive program, especially at a private school. Stanford lives – and dies – by the generosity of its alumni.

During the 2007-08 school year, Stanford had gross revenues of $76,661,466. Of that amount, 68% came from outside direct athletic department revenues. Stanford reported a $1 million dollar profit for the 2007-08 reporting period, leaving very little margin for error in the coming years.

Ohio State is facing the problem of trying to fund 36 varsity sports. There are 554 men and 474 women participating in varsity sports on the Columbus campus for a total of 1,028 varsity athletes.


In order to not have to cut any of its 36 varsity sports, Ohio State plans to raise football ticket prices slightly, and cut back on air travel

Ohio State – along with Texas – led way to athletic programs crossing the $100 million threshold on athletic revenues. For 2007-08, the Buckeyes reported:

Football Revenues $65,162,179           Football Expenses $33,063,248
Profit $32,098,931
Total Revenues $117,953,712

Ohio State reported total expenses of $98,981,205. However, not included in that amount was over $16 million set aside for annual Capital Debt payment. When that amount is thrown in, it sets up Ohio State to dip into the red in the upcoming year.

TEXAS, A DIFFERENT ECONOMIC MODEL — LESS IS MORE.

There is no guarantee that Texas will not feel the pain that others are enduring right now to the bottom line, especially if this downturn stretches out. But UT is in a more solid position to ride out the recession, thanks in part to deciding decades ago that concentrating on fewer varsity sports, and giving those sports full resources was the way to go.

Right now Texas supports 20 varsity sports. There are 328 male varsity participants and 295 female participants. That makes a total of 623 varsity athletes, or 24% fewer than Stanford, and 39% fewer than Ohio State.

When Texas made the choice to concentrate on the minimum or barely above the minimum number of sports needed for NCAA sanction, they also made another committment. That was to have the best intramural program in the country.


Over 23,000 students participate in the intramural sports program at the University of Texas.

The Texas Intramural Sports Program offers over 100 team, individual or dual events in Men’s Women’s and Coed Divisions. The sports range from football, basketball and softball all the way to indoor soccer and sports trivia. The intramural facilities are among the best in the nation and are in constant use.

For the 2007-08 years, Texas reported:
Football Revenue $72,952,397               Football Expenses $20,049,651
Profit $52,902,746.

Total Revenue $120,288, 370          Total Expenses $100,982,596
Profit $19,305,774


Newly renovated DKR-Texas Memorial Stadium offeres additional revenues

“Luck is When Preparation Meets Opportunity”

When Texas kicked off the 2008 football season, the expansion at the north end of the stadium was complete enough to allow for an additional 10,000 fans to enjoy the game. It also allowed UT to enjoy several added revenue streams, which were already in place before the current economic crisis hit full bore.

Aside from the additional money from ticket sales, there were 47 new suites. Those suites lease for an average of $62,000 annually — plus the cost of season tickets. The new suites brought the total to 111 througout the stadium and they were all taken. There was even a waiting list for future openings.

Another revenue stream that received a big boost was concessions. Then there are sponsorships. Want to put your message on “Godzillatron?” The going price last year was $250,000. The UT athletics department raised about $10 million in advertising revenue last year from corporate sponsorships, media rights, trademarks and licensing. As little as 15 years ago, that figure was just $570,000.

There are a few other programs, most notably Florida, who follow the Texas paradigm in setting up their athletic departments. And obviously, if the economic problems persist, Texas will also feel the loss in revenue as discretionary dollars will be squeezed even tighter.

But there can be no doubt that Texas is positioned better than almost any other collegiate athletic program to ride out this economic storm.

“We Are The Joneses”

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39 Responses

  1. Huckleberry said:

    February 12th, 2009 at 3:17 pm

    Good stuff.

    Odd that Stanford has their field hockey team playing on old-school AstroTurf given the significantly higher rate of knee injuries among female athletes.

  2. BrickHorn said:

    February 12th, 2009 at 3:26 pm

    Texas football: $52.9M profit. All other 19 varsity sports at UT: $33.6M loss.

    I guess we’re a football school.

  3. HenryJames said:

    February 12th, 2009 at 3:35 pm

    I don’t think I know anybody who went to UT that did not participate in some type of intramural sport.

    Except Huckleberry. Because no one wanted him on their team.

  4. Nero said:

    February 12th, 2009 at 3:39 pm

    Brick Horn – even though it doesn’t affect the overall numbers you mentioned, IIRC men’s basketball either breaks even or makes a profit at Texas. So it’s 18 sports that are losing the 33.6 million.

  5. ponderos said:

    February 12th, 2009 at 3:47 pm

    Then there’s Oklahoma State, who bet their future on T. Boone Pickens “donating” money to the athletics department into a hedge fund managed by his own company. That fund’s shitty performance is now endangering the lipstick OSU’s putting on their pig of an athletics program.

  6. SlickStreet said:

    February 12th, 2009 at 3:52 pm

    “That makes a total of 623 varsity athletes, or 24% fewer than Stanford…”

    That’s even more amazing since Stanford’s enrollment is so drastically smaller than ours.

  7. Scipio Tex said:

    February 12th, 2009 at 3:54 pm

    Great post, srr50.

    Basketball and football are the only two college sports that matter. And since those are the only two I care deeply about, that suits me fine.

    College baseball is a fun way to spend a good weather day and I have fond memories of skipping school to watch Scott Cooooooooooolbaugh and Kevin Garner, but it’s a regional sport with no national media coverage. It’s the warm weather equivalent of college hockey.

    DeLoss made a wise choice in deciding to be really good at a few non-revenue sports rather than spreading the wealth under some false doctrine of “fairness.” Like any good bureaucrat, he knows it’s far easier to start up a program than to end one.

  8. Scipio Tex said:

    February 12th, 2009 at 3:57 pm

    When did they discontinue intramural boxing at Texas? I used to love going into Gregory and seeing the old pictures. I always thought that would have been fun. I had to settle for Fight Night.

  9. Huckleberry said:

    February 12th, 2009 at 4:00 pm

    Except Huckleberry. Because no one wanted him on their team.

    You fool, my engineering team freaking owned the physics and math teams.

  10. dedfischer said:

    February 12th, 2009 at 4:25 pm

    Our baseball team is being housed in dugouts at the the Frontier Museum. We didn’t really think those Cu Chai tunnel replicas for the Nam Museum would serve a utilitarian purpose.

  11. Levander Williams said:

    February 12th, 2009 at 4:33 pm

    Good stuff, and a nice updated complement to the story about UT athletics that ran in Texas Monthly a couple of months ago.

  12. Tyler Durden said:

    February 12th, 2009 at 4:37 pm

    First rule of Fight Night:

    don’t talk about Fight Night.

  13. CloseToJumping said:

    February 12th, 2009 at 5:35 pm

    You know me, HenryJames, you insulated moron.

    Great post, srr50. I always enjoy reading about how our athletic program is so far and away ahead of the rest of the world.

  14. srr50 said:

    February 12th, 2009 at 6:44 pm

    Huck: Journalism > engineering > physics & math

    Brick: Men’s basketball cleared about $4.5 million.

    Scip: Thanks, BTW I have a sneaking suspicion that baseball is at least break even at Texas. After football and baseball, they don’t split out the revenue by sport, but revenues are listed at just over $5 million for all other sports.

    Baseball expenses are listed at just over $1 million, so I have to believe that UT is one of the few schools that makes money on baseball.

    As for boxing, I’m old, and I think it was already out as far as intramurals when I was in school.

    Thanks CTJ. I believe that in terms of keeping Texas ahead of the curve, and solvent, I think Deloss will harder to replace than some folks think.

  15. Bob in Houston said:

    February 12th, 2009 at 6:45 pm

    I didn’t do intramurals either. Spent all my spare time, and some non-spare time, at the Texan…

  16. bob said:

    February 12th, 2009 at 9:06 pm

    Ahhh intramurals… I remember when my friends and I played volleyball as ringers for the accounting school. Got all the way to the finals but it happened to be the day after a huge party. None of my friends showed up and I had to play with actual accounting students. Got killed. It was so bad the ref actually called me over and asked how the #$*( we got to the finals halfway through the game.

  17. Bow Shumbuckler said:

    February 12th, 2009 at 9:49 pm

    I spent all my time cruising the UGL for chicks. The row of private cubes for playing media was best.

  18. CrazyJoeDavola said:

    February 13th, 2009 at 12:08 am

    Good stuff, srr.

    It’s kind of funny/sad to see the griping that pops up whenever Texas does something like move a home game to accommodate TV, or charge higher ticket prices for attractive home games, rare as they are.

    The complaints usually boil down to “It’s just another example of the Athletic Department trying to squeeze money out of fans”.

    Well, duh. How else are we supposed to do stuff like add seats and lock up Will Muschamp? I was often infuriated with Dodds in the late ’80s/early ’90s, but that was because he didn’t seem to care about the product on the field/court.

    That’s clearly no longer an issue. Barring a complete economic collapse – in which case organized sports will be far down on the concern list – the steady and meticulous work he’s done on the financial front will allow Texas not merely to survive the downturn but perhaps even thrive during it, and certainly after it.

    I don’t want to credit him too much here, because it’s clearly been an institutional design and effort, but he’s definitely the figurehead/lightning rod. There are still a lot of people out there who hate the man for putting so much effort into making money.

  19. Scipio Tex said:

    February 13th, 2009 at 12:41 am

    I share your sentiments, CJD. Nicely said.

  20. TaylorTRoom said:

    February 13th, 2009 at 5:09 am

    How about Club Sports? We had a Pistol team that was based out of the (since demolished and replaced by a swimming pool) indoor rifle range behind the ROTC building. We were sponsored by NROTC (Gunny was our coach), and could get $500 per semester to fund trips to TAMU, SHSU, and UTA for matches. We weren’t allowed to spend the money on ammo, though. Good times.

    Every November, we had a “turkey shoot” fundraiser, where students could walk in and blaze away at a target (after safety instructions, of course) for a fee. We never advertised it much, even though there was great interest, because we knew the school would shut us down if they knew we were doing it.

  21. Bob in Houston said:

    February 13th, 2009 at 6:26 am

    “I don’t want to credit him too much here, because it’s clearly been an institutional design and effort, but he’s definitely the figurehead/lightning rod.”

    What?? You don’t think he had anything to do with the plan, or with directing it?

  22. The General said:

    February 13th, 2009 at 7:39 am

    And it probably all fails if we hire Gary Barnett.

  23. 8straight said:

    February 13th, 2009 at 7:54 am

    Lucky for DeLoss his legacy will be the last 15 years and not the first 15. We could all hope to go out like DeLoss.

  24. HenryJames said:

    February 13th, 2009 at 8:36 am

    Stanford has the mentality of an Ivy League school when it comes to athletics. All sports are pretty much equal, and they pull their athletes from all over the country including places where people actually give a shit about field hockey.

    Texas is not handicapped by this, and a big driver for athletics at Texas is the state high schools. No one plays water polo or men’s volleyball so we don’t need to have that sport at the college level. And there is no outside interest that would drive the addition of these marginal sports.

  25. Bob in Houston said:

    February 13th, 2009 at 8:57 am

    Actually, there has been water polo in Texas for several years.

  26. HenryJames said:

    February 13th, 2009 at 9:09 am

    And it’s clearly made an impact on the public consciousness.

  27. srr50 said:

    February 13th, 2009 at 9:18 am

    Almost as much as HS Lacrosse.

  28. Bateshorn said:

    February 13th, 2009 at 9:24 am

    By focusing on the minimum sports, it also dramatically limit’s UT’s exposure to title IX.

  29. BrickHorn said:

    February 13th, 2009 at 9:52 am

    Actually, there has been water polo in Texas for several years.

    I’ve never understood that sport. Do the horses wear snorkles or something?

  30. Bateshorn said:

    February 13th, 2009 at 9:59 am

    srr50-

    Lacrosse might be zilch in Texas, but in the mid atlantic, it’s a sport that draws. The NCAA lacrosse final four will fill Byrd stadium at Maryland (which is better than Friedgen’s teams can do).

  31. Scipio Tex said:

    February 13th, 2009 at 10:31 am

    I’ve never understood that sport. Do the horses wear snorkles or something?

    Man, that made me laugh.

  32. huge said:

    February 13th, 2009 at 10:39 am

    one of my highlights in college was beating the legal eagles…

  33. Bag said:

    February 13th, 2009 at 12:32 pm

    TTR-

    The pistol range is still there. The swimming pool awkwardly wraps around it, and you can still hear the pops of .22s when lounging at the pool.

    The pistol team was nearly dead around 05-06, but some guys were in the process of reviving it around ‘07, offering the plinking opportunity. Not sure if it made it or not.

  34. CrazyJoeDavola said:

    February 13th, 2009 at 4:46 pm

    “What?? You don’t think he had anything to do with the plan, or with directing it”

    BiH, I think he had a whole hell of a lot to do with it, but he wouldn’t have been able to accomplish it by himself without buy-in, and probably quite a bit of guidance from the rest of the institution.

    He wouldn’t have been able to do it without higher-ups supporting him, and he wouldn’t have been able to do it without good people working for him. But a lot of those folks have worked in relative anonymity, so I was just trying to make sure I didn’t ignore their contributions.

    Sorry I wasn’t clear about that.

  35. srr50 said:

    February 13th, 2009 at 5:56 pm

    DKR bought in to the idea of less is more, and helped shaped the institutional mindset.

    When Title IX came in, Royal set up a independent athletics department for women, and was thought of as trying to do the minimum required, or that he was trying to set up a “Separate but Equal,” sham.

    Most schools assimilated women’s athletics into the men’s department.

    Royal thought that keeping the women’s department independent, and hiring people who knew what they were doing to run it, would allow the women’s side to grow through fundraising — money that would not be raided by the men’s side. If you look at the majority of women’s programs befoe the NCAA assimilated them ito the fold, Texas dominated, directly because it was independent of the men.

    His hiring of Donna Lopiano to run the women’s side was key. She had a personality that didn’t set well with a lot of folks (including Royal at times), but she established a program that could stand alone and thrive. She also understood the “less is more” theory as well. Just look at how long it took Texas to begin women’s softball (which was the sport Lopiano dominated as an athlete). She waited until it was building up in the HS ranks and until she had the money and resources to move to it.

    Royal treated the women’s side like he treated the other men’s programs — hire someone you trust and then leave them alone.

  36. Horn777 said:

    February 13th, 2009 at 9:06 pm

    “BiH, I think he had a whole hell of a lot to do with it, but he wouldn’t have been able to accomplish it by himself without buy-in, and probably quite a bit of guidance from the rest of the institution.”

    Actually, when Tom Hicks was a new regent, things began to change. He helped change the old mindset. DeLoss was used to having to go to the regents, hat in hand, and presenting a bare-bones budget every year. Hicks asked DeLoss what it would take to put UT in the top echelon facility wise and in essence changed the entire approach to athletics. I will always appreciate Hicks for his foresight. BTW Hicks younger brother, Steve, was appointed to the regents yesterday.

  37. Don Gato said:

    February 13th, 2009 at 10:31 pm

    Ah.. the pistol range…Now, that brought back memories of my days on the 40 acres. I took a couple of shooting classes there.

  38. Roach said:

    February 16th, 2009 at 11:23 pm

    Mack Brown is the reason the athletic department is successful. Although Deloss was smart enough to keep Brown and leverage his success into the stadium renovations and program wide improvements. (Tech fans take note). If it wasn’t for Mack Brown Texas would still be selling 10 end zone tickets at HEB.

    There were fewer sports at UT when I was in school, and trust me no one was writing Deloss was a genius when Mackovic was loosing to Rice.

    Make no mistake Mack is the one we will miss. The ONLY sport that matters at Texas is football. If football regresses significantly, paying back the stadium debt will make Deloss’ name a curse word at UT again.

  39. c.c.rider said:

    March 5th, 2009 at 6:45 pm

    “When did they discontinue intramural boxing at Texas? I used to love going into Gregory and seeing the old pictures. I always thought that would have been fun. I had to settle for Fight Night”

    1957……it was fun

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