WVU reaches full revenue sharing, AD Wren Baker dealing with drawbacks

MORGANTOWN On June 6, college athletics was sent into a spiral.

It had already been getting out of hand, but it took a dive into the deep end.

In the House v.

NCAA settlement, it stated college athletes were allowed to be paid directly by the universities, as a revenue-sharing agreement, up to around $20.5 million.

Another chapter in the ever-changing world of college athletics.

West Virginia AD Wren Baker immediately sprang into action.

Just 12 days after the settlement, WVU announced Gold & Blue Enterprise, which was created to help WVU get to the $20.5 million.

During Bakers preseason press conference on Friday morning, he announced that WVU raised the $20.5 million.

It was a massive hurdle to get to 20.5 million, and it really took everybody, Baker said.

Weve been able to grow revenues in the athletic department by a substantial amount this year.

Still have a couple of new revenue streams that we havent announced yet that will come out.

Over the summer, WVU announced a partnership with Planet Fitness, secured two craft beer partnerships, and even named Grant County Mulch the official mulch of WVU.

Baker said WVU season ticket numbers are at 33,208, almost 6,000 more than last year.

The money is coming from everywhere, including a new $125 Mountaineer Athletic Advantage Fee as part of the schools tuition for WVU students on the Morgantown campus.

That fee is charged every semester, raising an estimated $11 million per school year.

Since the settlement, WVU has been entirely focused on generating revenue to get to the $20.5 million.

However, it came with the drawback of not fully meeting the scholarship requests for some Olympic sports.

Thats crucial for our Olympic sports to be able to compete at the level that they are, that we add those scholarships, Baker said.

Thats something that were working on, even now, trying to plan for that for next year.

Bakers reasoning for focusing on the revenue-sharing rather than the scholarships came down to that football and mens basketball run an athletic department.

Without a successful football or basketball program, the other sports cant be supported financially.

Its important to invest in the football and basketball programs, and the way to do it now is through revenue-sharing.

You cant have a successful athletic program if you dont have football and mens basketball performing at a level where youre bringing in the kind of resources that need the rest of the program, Baker said.

Part of the revenue-sharing is sharing.

However, its hard to evenly share the revenue because, like Baker said, football and mens basketball bring in the most money.

Baker didnt provide specifics on what sport will get what percentage.

Most speculated that football would get around 75-85%, mens basketball 10-20%, and then the rest of the sports get the leftover.

He did reiterate WVUs formula of what you bring in is what you get in return.

Its getting harder to turn down those other sports, especially with the recent success in baseball and womens basketball.

Weve got a lot of other sports that did a lot of great things too, Baker said.

Were not waving the white flag saying, Hey, were going to give up trying to compete in these Olympic sports.

We still want to be excellent there, but we also know that we have to be excellent and competitive in those two graduate sports.

Its a challenge.

Its something we talk about every day, and its something that when we have conversations about it, sometimes theres new information.

Baker looked at the $20.5 million as a big pie.

When a coach came to ask for more money, it would directly take from another program.

Its a jigsaw puzzle with multiple different pieces that need to work together.

But everybody wants a custom piece, Baker said.

May not be able to satisfy all of that and still satisfy our other regulatory environments.

But I think well at least try to get a sense for what the needs are in each of these for each of our sports teams, and can we fit those pieces together? Its a juggling act, and getting even harder the more success a program has.

Its also hard to generate this amount of money every year.

Bakers not alone, though.

Multiple other institutions around the country are trying to figure out.

Its actually a bit easier for WVU since it doesnt have too many other Division I sports.

Bakers still trying to figure it out, and when he does, he probably wont be the athletic director at WVU anymore.

I would be consulting with four or five schools for about half a million dollars each, Baker said.

Telling them this is what you got to do to be prepared for how this shakes out...

I am very concerned about the overall ecosystem of college sports and how sustainable it is, especially for broad-based support..

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