UConn Dan
Not HuskyFanDan; I lurk & I like
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http://www.usatoday.com/story/sport...aa-tournament-national-championship/70740612/
Excerpt:
Undefeated Kentucky, the dominant story of this weekend's Final Four, has not lost since last season's national championship game to Ollie's Huskies. Kentucky coach John Calipari is making nearly $6.4 million this season, more than double Ollie's compensation (though Calipari's figure includes outside income and Ollie's is unavailable). The generated revenue of Kentucky's athletics department for the 2013-14 fiscal year was $95.8 million, more than double UConn's $44.3 million, based on the schools' most recent financial reports to the NCAA.
That disparity illustrates a growing gap between schools in the five power conferences and the rest. In 2008-09, when Connecticut was in the Big East, the difference in the average generated revenue of public schools there and in the Southeastern Conference was $34.9 million. By 2013-14, when Connecticut was in the newly formed American Athletic Conference, the difference between the AAC's public schools and the SEC's was $64.9 million.
Kentucky resides in the lordly SEC, where football ticket sales and TV contracts fill the coffers. UConn wound up in the AAC during this decade's musical chairs of conference realignment. All of which leaves Connecticut in the awkward position of having the cachet, but not the cash, of a traditional power school.
That quandary is on full view in an analysis by USA TODAY Sports that found the average compensation for coaches from 29 tournament schools in the Power 5 was nearly $2.9 million, or a little less than Ollie's package, while the average compensation for coaches from 35 tourney schools outside the Power 5 was $821,000. UConn, which did not make the tournament, pays Ollie well more than triple that.
"Sports is the glue that brings people together," university President Susan Herbst tells USA TODAY Sports. "UConn has never been in this for the money." She pauses. "Although I want everyone to know we're open to more money."
Herbst has no qualms about paying Ollie $3 million, even when direct university subsidies to the athletics department have tripled in five years to $17.3 million.
"Coaching salaries don't bother me," she says. "I understand that many people, myself included, work super hard all the time and have aggravating jobs and don't get paid to that level. But we don't do our jobs on ESPN at 9 p.m. Eastern time. Thankfully! I don't think anyone would want to be a college president if that were the case — do your job in front of these highly critical, highly engaged fans, and haters, watching you do it in public all the time. That's worth a lot of money."
Excerpt:
Undefeated Kentucky, the dominant story of this weekend's Final Four, has not lost since last season's national championship game to Ollie's Huskies. Kentucky coach John Calipari is making nearly $6.4 million this season, more than double Ollie's compensation (though Calipari's figure includes outside income and Ollie's is unavailable). The generated revenue of Kentucky's athletics department for the 2013-14 fiscal year was $95.8 million, more than double UConn's $44.3 million, based on the schools' most recent financial reports to the NCAA.
That disparity illustrates a growing gap between schools in the five power conferences and the rest. In 2008-09, when Connecticut was in the Big East, the difference in the average generated revenue of public schools there and in the Southeastern Conference was $34.9 million. By 2013-14, when Connecticut was in the newly formed American Athletic Conference, the difference between the AAC's public schools and the SEC's was $64.9 million.
Kentucky resides in the lordly SEC, where football ticket sales and TV contracts fill the coffers. UConn wound up in the AAC during this decade's musical chairs of conference realignment. All of which leaves Connecticut in the awkward position of having the cachet, but not the cash, of a traditional power school.
That quandary is on full view in an analysis by USA TODAY Sports that found the average compensation for coaches from 29 tournament schools in the Power 5 was nearly $2.9 million, or a little less than Ollie's package, while the average compensation for coaches from 35 tourney schools outside the Power 5 was $821,000. UConn, which did not make the tournament, pays Ollie well more than triple that.
"Sports is the glue that brings people together," university President Susan Herbst tells USA TODAY Sports. "UConn has never been in this for the money." She pauses. "Although I want everyone to know we're open to more money."
Herbst has no qualms about paying Ollie $3 million, even when direct university subsidies to the athletics department have tripled in five years to $17.3 million.
"Coaching salaries don't bother me," she says. "I understand that many people, myself included, work super hard all the time and have aggravating jobs and don't get paid to that level. But we don't do our jobs on ESPN at 9 p.m. Eastern time. Thankfully! I don't think anyone would want to be a college president if that were the case — do your job in front of these highly critical, highly engaged fans, and haters, watching you do it in public all the time. That's worth a lot of money."
