The football complex is already built and is state of the art. The basketball complex is under construction, The Rent is only 10 years old. Unless you think P needs a huge raise or players should start being paid for their services, I think UCONN's athletic finances will be fine for the foreseeable future. I think its comical that people stress about the finances of this very wealthy and well funded university.
That's okay I find your naivete cute. UConn is neither well funded nor wealthy by the standards by which universities are judged. Our endowment is woefully underfunded compared to our peer institutions and even more so when compared to the institutions to which we aspire to become peers. Yes Shankman/Burton are first class facilities. The Rent needs to be expanded if we are to be competitive we the big boys. We are building a bball practice facility, but the cieling at Gampel is falling apart. (BTW, I wasn't aware that started on the baseball facility. If you get a chance, send me link? I took a quick look and couldn't find it.) We need to expand Freitas. We need to improve Marrone. I'm sure others can come up with more. But even if that were it, for capital improvements in the near term, we'll need to keep them up and improve them as they age, or as the "state of the art", always a moving target, changes.
But capital improvements are not the entire nut when comes to athletics. You have feed and house, and theoretically make up for lost tuition for all the the scholarship athletes and not for just the marquee sports, but all the olympics for men and for women. Again, that's just an enormous amount of money.
Now take Rutgers, which in many ways is a peer institution with a similar academic standing. Assuming that they'll receive say $25 million a year from TV revenue while we, and I'll be generous here, make $4 million, that's
$21 million a year that they will have access to that we do not. In five years that's over $100 million, even without considering the time value of money. You seriously believe that University of Connecticut has adequate resources to make up this number? How about when it doubles in a decade?
I don't think we can, or even should rely on the state to make up for the difference. The state of Connecticut is looking a tough time for the foreseeable future. It can't, and frankly should not, make up this difference.
Either we fix this shortfall, or we rollback our athletics dramatically. Those are the options. That's why money is important. Without access to capital, enterprises die. I personally don't see that outcome as comical.