Possibly, but that’s money the school does not have to solicit. Whether it goes through the AD or athletic department or football team directly is semantics.
It is not a coincidence that of the three public P5 teams in Texas, the two PUF schools (UT and A&M) are making money hand over fist and TxTech is barely breaking even, as I have read recently. All get P5 money, donations, fill stadiums etc.
Can’t argue that the PUF is not a massive advantage. Add 20+yrs of P5 money and it is not a great mystery. UH would be completely accelerated in its athletic and academic endeavors with a share of the PUF and P5 money.
I think I understand what you are saying. Basically the pressure to raise money for academic side is less so money raising for athletics is easier.
Although for UT I doubt it matters either way. They were able to meet their $3 billion academic/research fund raising months ahead of schedule. And boy did they make sure everyone knew it! I was living in Austin at that time and every newspaper and tv newscast was full of it!
Exactly. I am not in denial of the ability of UT to raise money, nor the fact that they fill up their stadium (although I have been to a few games that weren’t so full…married to a former UT athlete. She gets free tickets. Swallow my pride for love). As you know, I contend that the PUF gives a great advantage in the overall balance of the university’s funding, being a public institution, with funding being cut by the state (edit) overall. That’s why I always point out the ‘asterisk’ of the PUF when I see any discussion of UT revenue etc. Especially when discussed nationally and UT shows up at the top…there is a context that most people nationally do not know.
If ever there was an example of the rich getting richer.
It’ll be interesting to see how much of UTs total operating budget comes from PUF returns. I have read that UTIMCO is one of the best managed university endowment funds. At a time when Harvard and Yale endowments lost hundreds of millions, UTIMCO actually made a significant profit. Forbes has an entire article on it a couple of years ago.
One other thing I’d like to add to your point about UT being wealthy. It’s basically keeping the Big 12 viable and afloat, despite being in a 10 year garbage dump for football and basketball. I was really surprised when they agreed to equal revenue sharing in the Big 12, that really broke character.
Quick Wiki, in '08 PUF makes up less the 20% ($143mil) of the total yearly budget ($1billion). At one point, it was the sole source of revenue for the UT Austin. Article indicated that was the entire budget, did not indicate athletics or what portion was athletics. Still a significant contribution to the budget
UH could use an extra $143million…even a percentage if it was split with Tech would be a huge help.
Bleacher Report just released a preseason Top 25. Looks like they aren’t inflating UT’s ranking this year. Didn’t make the cut. Interestingly they have Memphis 2 spots above UCF, 23 and 25 respectively.