The hoops conference an economic game changer?

[Mucrisco]

I follow college basketball because I love watching the competition and I love the X's and O's of it. I leave the recruiting aspect up to you guys to inform me. The other aspect of college sports that I don't follow is the economics of it. With this new conference, if the reported numbers are true, and their is now a bidding war going on between networks, is this a game changer? What I mean, is that only a few schools make money on football, correct? With this new conference, if people see that these new schools are making money with a cheaper program like basketball, will they start to put more emphasis on their basketball teams? This new conference may not tip the scales towards basketball, but maybe it starts to even it out in the eyes of athletic department. However, like I said, I don't follow the economics of this at all. All I know is that college football is ruining college basketball. Is there any truth to what I am hoping for here?

[TheSultan]

Couple things....

First, the idea that a lot of schools don't make money on football is only true of you look at the football programs in a vacuum. There is a reason that a number of schools have started programs recently. It is a great way to market your school, especially if you can get the taxpayers and the students to fund the start up costs of a stadium, etc.

Second, I think the C7 is in a really unique position that can't easily be replicated by other schools. These 7 schools are part of a "BCS conference," but have a long and proud history of basketball success. With the five schools they invite, this is very likely going to be the premier basketball conference, that doesn't sponsor football, in the country. After this new conference is fully formed, what conference can duplicate this? The A10 remnants? The WCC?

Third, the timing is also great because you have multiple networks that are trying to line up sports properties. CBS, NBC and Fox are all trying to chip away at ESPN. It is a complete sellers market right now.

So I wouldn't call it a game-changer. I would call it multiple fortuitous circumstances that the C7 are poised to take advantage of.

[Alan Bykowski, "brewcity77"]

I don't think so. Despite how this is showing you can make a profit off a smaller investment, the football schools are all chasing the big money. There are 10 bowl games that have a higher average payout equal to or higher than what the average team in our league will make for an entire year. So you play one game, you make at least as much as we do all year long...and that's if you're in the Chick-Fil-A or Outback Bowl, most of the rest of those 10 make significantly more, up to $17-18M for the BCS games.

While only 20 schools make it to those games, There are 14 other games that pay out $1M or more for just the one game. So you have a total of 48 schools playing in single games that net them $1M or more. That's over a third of the college football programs, and doesn't take into account regular TV revenue, merchandising, or any other revenue streams, all of which make consistently more than basketball programs.

Granted, costs for football are significantly higher, so much so that most programs are operating at a loss, but if you strictly look at the numbers, 40% of the football schools see that $1M+ payday at the end of the year whereas our basketball schools will make about $3.4M but represent less than 4% of the basketball schools.

I'd love to see a shift, but I think people are still chasing the elusive golden goose of football profitability, and I don't see our 4% outlier offsetting the 40% numbers they see in their main sport.

[WindyCityGoldenEagle]

I am still in shock if the reported numbers actually come through (pleasantly shocked obviously). It's re-writing the media rule book. I agree that I don't think it will tip the scales but yes I do think it opens up some eyes in athletic departments across the nation and potentially leads to a change in long-term philosophy for many programs (short term however I think the football economic momentum is too strong to have the trajectory impacted right now).

[ValiantSailor]

I expect the college athletics game to change, but from a different direction. We're just starting to uncover the miasma of head injuries associated with football. I expect the insurance companies, with impetus from class-action lawyers, will react, eventually making football unaffordable for many people and many schools.

This won't happen overnight, but it will happen. Will basketball benefit, or some other sport, like soccer or LAX?

VS

[BLT]

Honestly, I liked the concept of a coast to coast hoops conference, being on tv for entire blocks. Mainly for overall university reputation and recruitment. Joining the Big East was a big boon for Marquette on many levels, including non-revenue sports and enrollment. MU's business situation in the 1990's was bleak as it viewed itself as Milwaukee's Catholic school. Fr. Wild changed that.

The population is moving south, where there is no conference school now. California's fiscal mess is hitting school funding deep and more kids are willing to consider moving east to private schools. More so, Milwaukee has grown light years as a young person's town along the whole East Side and many of the national fans were learning that from TV. In some ways, the proposed new conference is a step back from that..and that concerns me. On the other hand, MU was always treated as the step child in the BE and this move makes MU the prince, and the Fox deal looks like a great media opportunity for the conference, something the old BE never really got from ESPN in recent years.

[Gato78]

About one year ago or so, Hizzoner, Mayor Beluga, proposed an economic partnership with the BIG EAST and PAC12 that would have college sports on all day, coast to coast. It could be with its own network and would include a BBall challenge and other similar cross pollinations. Still a damn good idea.

[BLT]

About one year ago or so, Hizzoner, Mayor Beluga, proposed an economic partnership with the BIG EAST and PAC12 that would have college sports on all day, coast to coast. It could be with its own network and would include a BBall challenge and other similar cross pollinations. Still a damn good idea.

I like it. And maybe with Fox as the media partner it has a chance at some point to make it happen. I think it is in 2017 that the majority of families with kids will be families considered minority today. Future college enrollment base will be west and south that means, not Dayton OH.

[TheSultan]

The population is moving south, where there is no conference school now. California's fiscal mess is hitting school funding deep and more kids are willing to consider moving east to private schools. More so, Milwaukee has grown light years as a young person's town along the whole East Side and many of the national fans were learning that from TV. In some ways, the proposed new conference is a step back from that..and that concerns me. On the other hand, MU was always treated as the step child in the BE and this move makes MU the prince, and the Fox deal looks like a great media opportunity for the conference, something the old BE never really got from ESPN in recent years.


While I understand that the population is moving south, do you realize that the median center of the US population is still in southwest Indiana? That means as many people live west of that point as east...and as many live south as north. (This is not the mean center...which is distance weighted. Google it up if you want to know the difference.)

There are still crap loads of people on the east coast and the upper midwest. And that isn't going to change anytime soon....it will take generations.

[BLT]

Honestly, I liked the concept of a coast to coast hoops conference, being on tv for entire blocks. Mainly for overall university reputation and recruitment. Joining the Big East was a big boon for Marquette on many levels, including non-revenue sports and enrollment. MU's business situation in the 1990's was bleak as it viewed itself as Milwaukee's Catholic school. Fr. Wild changed that.

The population is moving south, where there is no conference school now. California's fiscal mess is hitting school funding deep and more kids are willing to consider moving east to private schools. More so, Milwaukee has grown light years as a young person's town along the whole East Side and many of the national fans were learning that from TV. In some ways, the proposed new conference is a step back from that..and that concerns me. On the other hand, MU was always treated as the step child in the BE and this move makes MU the prince, and the Fox deal looks like a great media opportunity for the conference, something the old BE never really got from ESPN in recent years.


While I understand that the population is moving south, do you realize that the median center of the US population is still in southwest Indiana? That means as many people live west of that point as east...and as many live south as north. (This is not the mean center...which is distance weighted. Google it up if you want to know the difference.)

There are still crap loads of people on the east coast and the upper midwest. And that isn't going to change anytime soon....it will take generations.

Senior citizens don't attend colleges in big numbers. College aged kids in 10-15 years will be Hispanic, Asian, African American and Middle East origin in much majority proportions, if not now in California. This is where the the pool will be...and guess what? They live in and migrate to Florida, Texas, California, Atlanta, etc. in increasing numbers. More so, many will be first generation college kids whose families have never heard of Marquette, let alone Milwaukee. Now, do the big northern cities like Chicago and NY also have large numbers of minorities still, of course. But, there is a dramatic shift going on as seen in the last election.

[TheSultan]

Not going to argue with demographics, but you are overstating its importance completely. It's not as though people are fleeing the midwest and the northeast. Both are growing, albiet at slower rates. The C7 really can't worry about that.

[Goose85]

Football at the highest level brings 75,000 people (UW) to campus on about 7 Saturdays a year. Not only great national exposure and school pride, but great way to connect with the university. I have high school age kids and some I've spoken too, smart kids, want to go to a school with big time football (Big 10 or ND). Many kids want that as part of their college experience. Basketball only can't touch that, so NCAA exposure is what matters.

Football is king and will be for a long time. The positive development is that networks are now looking for content and that will help make the Basketball 7 conferences a positive financial endeavor, and one that will stay on in the public eye and not drift into mid major status.