Schools like Wake are in a different spot then the publics. Wake competes for students with elite private schools like the Ivies and the UAA schools. I think it is unlikely they would pass up the net revenue, but it is not out of the question that they or Vanderbilt draw the line at paying players. U of Chicago still gets a lot of mileage from discontinuing a powerhouse football program 80 years ago because it was contrary to their mission as a university. The vast majority of the students at a school like Wake do not identify with the other ACC student bodies or think much of a "rivalry". They think they are superior to Clemson students, and they are right for the most part. Paying players makes Wake a semi-pro program, and there is a stigma that will attach to that when it comes to attracting top students, and more importantly, top faculty.
I thought paying players was going to be a very tough line for the Wakes and Vanderbilts to cross. We shall see.
I assumed you meant AAU as it was either going to be the University Athletic Association or University of Alaska-Anchorage.
Division III schools (like in the UAA) are very far removed from P5 autonomy legislation. Not even the 1-AA or non-P5 1-A schools are considering pay for play. Yes, NYU, Washington MO, Chicago, Brandeis, Rochester, Emory, Case Western Reserve and Carnegie-Mellon are all great universities, but they aren't even tracking what is going on in division 1-AA athletics much less the P5. And Wake may compete for
students with those schools, but not
student-athletes. No offense to the student-athlete, but schools like Northwestern, Vandy, Stanford, Notre Dame, Berkeley, Wake, Duke, UNC and UVa bend the rules to get some athletes into their school. For example, 5 star athletes Daryl Blackstock, Ahmad Brooks and Morgan Moses couldn't qualify at Virginia Tech but made it in to the ever so prestigious UVa. Go figure. I'm sure those guys could have ended up at UNC as well. Now, Duke and Wake hold a bit of a higher standard like Stanford. Their student-athletes seem fairly intelligent, but they wouldn't get into those schools if it were not for athletics.