USA Today’s yearly list of public Division I program finances is now out. Texas checked in at the No. 1 spot with $214 million in revenue for 2016-17.
Oh, now we have multiple college athletic departments bringing in $200 million each per year
Everything’s bigger in Texas.
Photo by Chris Covatta/Getty Images
Perhaps more importantly, the Longhorns surpassed longtime rival Texas A&M, which had the No. 1 spot due to unusually big facility donations. Before A&M’s jump up top, Nike’s Phil Knight almost single-handedly put Oregon at No. 1 over Texas, which at the time was pretty significant. But Texas being at No. 1 means things are back to normal.
Here’s a quick look at the top 10 — both A&M and Texas raked in over $200M, another sign that a ton of money is flowing through college athletics.
- Texas: $214,830,647
- Texas A&M: $211,960,034
- Ohio State: $185,409,602
- Michigan: $185,173,187
- Alabama: $174,307,419
- Georgia: $157,852,479
- Oklahoma: $155,238,481
- Florida: $149,165,475
- LSU: $147,744,233
- Auburn: $147,511,034
Big Ten schools were up near the top, with eight schools checking into the top 25. The SEC had six schools crack the top 10, in Auburn, Florida, Georgia, LSU, and TAMU. The ACC had just two schools in the top 25, in Florida State and Louisville, and the Pac-12 had Oregon at 12.
Overall the SEC, just like last year, is lapping the competition with those revenue numbers, with an average profit of $17.3M. The Big 12 had $8.5M, Big Ten $3.1M, Pac-12 $1.1M, and the ACC clocked in at negative-$1.5M.
A few things to remember:
- College sports accounting is fuzzy and often rigged to make schools look poorer than they are.
- This only includes public schools.
- This counts schools where they were last year, not next year.
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