The Internet brings us a lot of nifty things, and one of those is the finances of the athletic departments of public schools. It looks like just a bunch of numbers on a screen, but there are a lot of interesting conclusions to take away if you know how to look at them:
- Craig Littlepage's job is probably safer than a lot of fans might like. The biggest complaint UVA fans bring about Littlepage is his oversight of mediocrity in the revenue sports (i.e., football and men's basketball.) Those seasons last year were undeniably ugly, but Littlepage runs the second most-profitable athletic department in the ACC (note: public only; private schools don't have to report and there are four of those in the conference.) Despite the failure of the exposure teams to have any meaningful success, the department raked in over three million dollars' worth of profit. That's the kind
of success that'll keep an athletic director safe and sound.
- The UVA student fees system works nicely for all involved. And that's an understatement. Actually, I have no idea where they're getting $7 million+ from the students, since the activities fee is only $47 and that doesn't add up. A lot of lost ID's, late fees, and the like, I guess. Still, UVA brings in more money from student fees than any of the competition, and at the same time is fourth among the public ACC schools in football ticket sales revenues? Why is that significant? Because UVA is the only school here to have a huge chunk of non-paying customers in the stadium in the form of a student section that got in free to the game. UVA students might get socked with more fees than elsewhere, but they make up for it with the privilege of strolling up to the gate and swiping their ID on football Saturdays. No politicking for the good seats at the ticket office, no fretting over whether there will be tickets remaining when they get there. This is the sort of thing that makes folks jealous. And the school still pockets all the money it needs. Everybody wins.
- We have some rich alums. In a year that saw the stock market lose everything for everyone, and everyone with a job lost it, and the government decided to fix it with unheard of amounts of money they didn't have, UVA raked in almost twice as much in "contributions" (almost $28 million) as the next closest rival (Florida State, $16 million). They're not kidding when they say that's the lifeblood of the program. Makes you wonder what that column might look like with a working economy and decent football and basketball teams.
- And finally, things are looking decidedly up as far as money goes. Hard to overanalyze this. In a year when the football team left over a million dollars on the table by not selling out the stadium, the severance payment to Dave Leitao ate up almost half the profits, and the economy was in the dumps, bringing in a profit ought to be a considered a major achievement. Bringing in a bigger profit than most of the competition means that when it's time to make another big investment (like, a new football coach) there should be no excuses.
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