EDIT - so I ended up doing a much deeper dive into this info today, and it isn't as simple as I made it sound yesterday. Here is a link to a post in another thread to looks deeper into the differences between Neb & OSU in particular. The difference in Football Expenses isn't nearly as bad as I initially thought below.
ORIGINAL POST:
Sorry, really long post with lots of data.
TLDR version - Nebraska Football Expenses are much less than many of their peers in the Big Ten and nationally; are fans' and administrations' expectations of winning reasonable?
Sportico posted this pretty awesome database today. You can find out all sorts of financial info.
link
There are 52 Power Five teams that have publicly available data, with 13 Big Ten teams (Northwestern data not available).
The most recent data is 2019-20.
Nebraska ranks:
Total Revenue - 19th out of 52 nationally, 6th out of 13 in Big Ten (#1 Nationally - Oregon $391M, #1 Big Ten - OSU $234M, NU - $134M)
Ticket Sales - 11th, 4th (#1 Nationally & Big Ten - OSU $66M; NU - $38M)
Donations - 50th, 12th (Oregon $298M, OSU - $48M, NU - $7.2M)
Royalties, Licensing, Advertising - 3rd, 2nd (Texas - $39M, OSU - $31M, NU - $28M)
Total Expenses - 26th, 9th (#1 Nationally & Big Ten - OSU $215M, NU - $121M)
Total Football Expenses - 27th, 9th (FSU - $68M, OSU - $53M, NU - $33M)
Football Coaching Staff Salaries - 28th, 9th (Ala - $18.7M, MSU -$18.6M, NU - $9.7M)
Football Recruiting - 18th, 5th (Georgia - $2.7M, PSU - $1.1M, NU - $770K)
There is a ton of other categories, but those are the ones I focused on.
My thoughts:
- fortunately Nebraska fans are still coming to games because Nebraska ranks 11th nationally in Ticket Sales - imagine what happens to this revenue category if football stops being a sellout
- the brand is still strong - rank 3rd nationally in Royalties, Licensing, Advertising
- Donations to Nebraska are pretty pitiful - if Nebraska donations doubled they still wouldn't be in the Top 40 nationally - just one example is Wyoming gets more in donations than Nebraska
- while Total Football Expenses aren't directly related to winning (FSU is exhibit A of that principal) I think it is fair to question if Nebraska is spending enough on what is supposed to be the crown jewel of the Athletic Department - the only Big Ten schools that spend less are Illinois, Indiana, Purdue & Maryland
- same issue with Football Coaching Staff Salaries - only Big Ten schools that spend less are Indiana, Rutgers, Illinois & Maryland
- among Nebraska's Big Ten "peers" - OSU, Michigan, Penn St, Iowa, Wisconsin, & Michigan St - everyone except WI spends $3M more than Nebraska on Football Coaching Staff (and yes, I know the argument that Nebraska shouldn't have been paying more for that 2019-2020 coaching staff, or the current one for that matter)
- considering all the challenges of recruiting for Nebraska, why is more money not devoted to solving this problem? Georgia ($2.7M), Alabama ($2.1M) and Clemson ($1.55M) are all in far more fertile recruiting territories yet spend 2 to almost 4 times as much as Nebraska (of course the counter argument there is WI spends a little more than 1/2 of what Nebraska did, and still kicks our rear every year)
It is possible that different schools categorize certain revenues/expenses differently, but I've taken this data at face value as a true apples to apples comparison of each category. Also remember, all this data is from 2019-20 so some things could have changed/improved. Assuming things have remained fairly steady since then, the question is are Nebraska's finances, in particular Total Football Expenses, in line with expectations of being competitive in the Big Ten West and beyond?
ORIGINAL POST:
Sorry, really long post with lots of data.
TLDR version - Nebraska Football Expenses are much less than many of their peers in the Big Ten and nationally; are fans' and administrations' expectations of winning reasonable?
Sportico posted this pretty awesome database today. You can find out all sorts of financial info.
link
There are 52 Power Five teams that have publicly available data, with 13 Big Ten teams (Northwestern data not available).
The most recent data is 2019-20.
Nebraska ranks:
Total Revenue - 19th out of 52 nationally, 6th out of 13 in Big Ten (#1 Nationally - Oregon $391M, #1 Big Ten - OSU $234M, NU - $134M)
Ticket Sales - 11th, 4th (#1 Nationally & Big Ten - OSU $66M; NU - $38M)
Donations - 50th, 12th (Oregon $298M, OSU - $48M, NU - $7.2M)
Royalties, Licensing, Advertising - 3rd, 2nd (Texas - $39M, OSU - $31M, NU - $28M)
Total Expenses - 26th, 9th (#1 Nationally & Big Ten - OSU $215M, NU - $121M)
Total Football Expenses - 27th, 9th (FSU - $68M, OSU - $53M, NU - $33M)
Football Coaching Staff Salaries - 28th, 9th (Ala - $18.7M, MSU -$18.6M, NU - $9.7M)
Football Recruiting - 18th, 5th (Georgia - $2.7M, PSU - $1.1M, NU - $770K)
There is a ton of other categories, but those are the ones I focused on.
My thoughts:
- fortunately Nebraska fans are still coming to games because Nebraska ranks 11th nationally in Ticket Sales - imagine what happens to this revenue category if football stops being a sellout
- the brand is still strong - rank 3rd nationally in Royalties, Licensing, Advertising
- Donations to Nebraska are pretty pitiful - if Nebraska donations doubled they still wouldn't be in the Top 40 nationally - just one example is Wyoming gets more in donations than Nebraska
- while Total Football Expenses aren't directly related to winning (FSU is exhibit A of that principal) I think it is fair to question if Nebraska is spending enough on what is supposed to be the crown jewel of the Athletic Department - the only Big Ten schools that spend less are Illinois, Indiana, Purdue & Maryland
- same issue with Football Coaching Staff Salaries - only Big Ten schools that spend less are Indiana, Rutgers, Illinois & Maryland
- among Nebraska's Big Ten "peers" - OSU, Michigan, Penn St, Iowa, Wisconsin, & Michigan St - everyone except WI spends $3M more than Nebraska on Football Coaching Staff (and yes, I know the argument that Nebraska shouldn't have been paying more for that 2019-2020 coaching staff, or the current one for that matter)
- considering all the challenges of recruiting for Nebraska, why is more money not devoted to solving this problem? Georgia ($2.7M), Alabama ($2.1M) and Clemson ($1.55M) are all in far more fertile recruiting territories yet spend 2 to almost 4 times as much as Nebraska (of course the counter argument there is WI spends a little more than 1/2 of what Nebraska did, and still kicks our rear every year)
It is possible that different schools categorize certain revenues/expenses differently, but I've taken this data at face value as a true apples to apples comparison of each category. Also remember, all this data is from 2019-20 so some things could have changed/improved. Assuming things have remained fairly steady since then, the question is are Nebraska's finances, in particular Total Football Expenses, in line with expectations of being competitive in the Big Ten West and beyond?
Last edited:
