As we approach the middle of the summer, in most years I would begin to pay more attention to college football. It is my second favorite sport, after college basketball, and I love its pageantry and intensity. As the cool fall weather moves in, it seems the perfect sport with helmeted, and armor-clad (of sorts) gladiators clashing in front of thousands of excited fans.
I really enjoy watching the big boys of the sport battle it out in packed stadiums in places like Columbus and Tuscaloosa. I also enjoy the spectacle of the marching bands, cheerleaders and the crazed fans dressed in the colors of their school.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, I fear there will not be any college football this year. The so-called “Power Five” schools in the major conferences (Big Ten, Atlantic Coast, Big 12, Southeast and Pac-12) will lose millions in revenue because of empty stadiums and cancelled lucrative television contracts. It will hurt, but most of them are large enough to absorb the losses for a single season. The schools that will really suffer if the season is cancelled are the so-called “Group of Five” schools that make up the bottom tier of Division I college football.
One of the five conferences in the Group of Five is the Mid-American Conference (MAC) which includes my alma mater, Miami University and the school where I worked and taught for 30 years, the University of Akron. While MAC schools play in the FBS (Football Bowl Subdivision) of the NCAA’s Division I along with the Power Five schools, most MAC schools don’t compare in terms of revenue, fan base and attendance with the big schools.
Ohio State routinely draws over 100,000 fans to each game to the “Horseshoe” on the banks of the Olentangy River in Columbus. In contrast, most MAC schools don’t draw that many fans in a home season of six games. OSU’s annual athletic budget of $205 million in 2018 was six times greater than the annual athletic budget of about $35 million for UA.
Licensing of merchandise, ticket sales and income from television of Ohio State’s football games provides enough money to support the university’s entire athletic program. About two-thirds of the University of Akron’s annual athletic budget comes from campus activity fees that each UA student pays every semester—the rest coming from ticket sales, licensing of merchandise, concessions, parking fees and broadcast rights.
In order to remain in Division I-FBS, member schools need have an average “attendance” of at least 15,000 per home game at least once every two years. Actually, the requirement is for tickets sold and at some MAC schools, the university further subsidizes the football program by purchasing additional tickets to make the limit and then gives them away in the community. Many MAC schools miss the actual 15,000 attendance mark for most home games.
Also, every MAC school schedules two or three “money” games each season against Power Five schools that provide a six- or seven-figure paycheck. The MAC’s Kent State football team is scheduled to play three games at Penn State, Kentucky and Alabama in 2020 and will receive $4.5 million in guaranteed income. This amounts to more than 15 percent of the school’s total athletic budget for the year. According to Crain’s Cleveland Business, the 12 MAC schools receive about 68 percent of their athletic budgets from student fees.
In the MAC and many of the other Group of Six schools, football is a money loser that needs additional funding from the school to continue—mostly in the form of student fees and tickets purchased. NCAA rules also stipulate that schools may offer up to 85 full scholarships for football but they can’t be divided among more than one athlete. Schools routinely give partial scholarships to athletes in other sports like track and field, baseball, volleyball, softball and so on.
So, what’s the point here? The point is that the COVID-19 pandemic will deal a serious blow to MAC schools that will have to pay the scholarships for the football players and other athletes even if the season is cancelled. Also, nine of the 12 members of the MAC are located in Ohio and Michigan, two states with stagnant population growth and less than stellar economies. These state-supported schools are facing declining enrollments due to a drop in the number of high school graduates and their budgets are being rocked by the effects of the pandemic.
Ohio Governor Mike DeWine has ordered state-supported schools to cut their budgets by 20 percent for the upcoming school year. If the pandemic lasts into 2021, then there will be more budget cuts for the next school year.
I think it is time for the members of the MAC to consider moving their football programs to the Football Championship Series of Division I. The savings would be significant. First, FCS programs are limited to 63 football scholarships and have no minimum attendance requirement. Also, there are smaller coaching staffs and lower travel costs with fewer athletes. Such a move would save the University of Akron over $2 million per year in scholarship costs alone. There also would be other savings by not buying “phantom” tickets to meet the attendance requirement. And there could be savings by reductions in athletic department staffs.
It would also reduce the some of the embarrassing losses that MAC teams suffer at the hands of Power Five schools in the first two or three weeks of the season. While there are always a few signature wins over big schools by MAC football teams in these “money” games, the majority of the time, the only consolation for MAC schools is the size of the check they bring home after being blown out.
On Oct. 20, 1990, the UA Zips football team travelled to Gainesville, FL, to play the Florida Gators of the Southeastern Conference. Akron lost 59-0 and reportedly six players suffered season-ending injuries in that game. These money games are often a travesty and some season ticket holders for major college programs wonder why they should pay for these games.
On Sept. 20, 1966, Miami University defeated Indiana of the Big Ten by a score of 20-10 on the road. I was a freshman at MU and had finished my second week of class. That sunny Saturday afternoon, I was hanging out with new acquaintances in the East Quad. We played some touch football and mostly enjoyed the beautiful weather and attempted to de-stress from our first semester in college.
Suddenly, word began to spread that Miami’s football team was leading Indiana in the second half. One student moved his radio next to an open window and dozens of us listened as Miami’s announcers described the end of the game. Dozens of us headed for nearby Miami Field to try to take down the goal posts and march uptown with them. When we arrived, the Miami Police department had opened the gates of the stadium and one officer on a bullhorn was giving instructions on how to lift the goal posts out or the ground to minimize damage.
Hundreds of students marched up High Street carrying the goal posts to the center of Oxford. I helped lean one of the goal posts against the front of the Purity, then the most popular bar in town. At four in the afternoon, the bars lining High Street were packed and the party went on late into the evening. It was a great display of school spirit.
Fast forward more that 50 years, and most MAC teams are no longer competitive with Power Five teams. And most MAC members are in states with diminished numbers of high school students and poor economic prospects for the next couple of years. When schools are being forced to cut academic programs and reduce faculty and staff, a voluntary reduction to step down to the FCS division for football would be a good political and economic move on most campuses. It’s time for the MAC schools to consider it.
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