If you didn’t realize how important college football is to an athletic department’s bottom line, this should highlight it.
In the midst of the spreading coronavirus pandemic, some connected to the game of college football are decidedly pessimistic that the upcoming season will be played. Others are expressing cautious optimism. For now, at least.
Brett McMurphy of The Stadium conducted a survey of 130 athletic directors with FBS programs, with 112 of them participating. According to McMurphy, the ADs “were asked to rank their optimism on the upcoming season being played from ‘1' (will not be played) to ’10' (definitely will be played).”
Not a single AD gave less than a “5" in response, meaning everyone who responded, at least at this time, feels there’s at least a 50-50 chance the season will go off as planned. A slight majority of respondents (51%) assigned either the numbers seven or eight in McMurphy’s survey. One-quarter of them were decidedly optimistic with either a nine or 10 as a response. Most of that optimism was on the part of Group of Five programs that, already financially reeling from the distilled NCAA’s revenue distribution last month, desperately need a college football season to be played.
If the college football season is to start on time -- the first games are scheduled for Aug. 29 -- what would be the absolute latest teams could start reconvening and prepping for the 2020 campaign? The answer you get depends on the individual you ask. Some would say early June at the absolute latest. Others have said the middle of July.
So, what if the season is canceled? Completely?
“If there’s no season, we will be f*****,” an anonymous AD told McMurphy.
A tweet from Ross Dellenger of SI.com very plainly illustrates how reliant athletic departments are on revenue from college football.
When you hear things from ADs like "football allows us to have other sports," this is what they mean.
— Ross Dellenger (@RossDellenger) March 31, 2020
Take #LSU. Here are profit/loss numbers from each LSU sport in the 2016-17 cycle, from my time as a beat writer.
- Football: $56M in profit
- Other sports: ~$23M in losses pic.twitter.com/3Giw1YrdZF
Suffice to say, if the 2020 college football season is completely wiped out, non-revenue sports will be cut. Lots of them will be shuttered, more than likely.
The good news, such as it is, is that the powers-that-be in the sport will go to great lengths to save the 2020 college football season. In fact, one report earlier today suggested that the season could start as late as January of next year. How that would work with players who are eligible for the 2021 NFL Draft would have to be worked out, as would myriad other issues.
While it’s way too early to form a concrete opinion, there’s little doubt that all connected to the sport will exhaust every option to save the 2020 college football season. And, if the season is canceled? It’ll mean we all have a helluva lot more to worry about than sports.