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Unfortunately, UNC athletics is not playing with a full deck.
As a follow-up to Thursday’s column and the feedback from it, reality is biting Carolina and its long-heralded athletic prowess.
Remember when the Tar Heels made the initial commitment to a broad-based department that gives as many students as possible a chance to play a varsity sport? The price tag for 20-plus teams was far more manageable than it is today. Budget costs have risen from the multi-millions and much higher, factoring in a new basketball arena.
UNC’s fund-raising chops are envied by many major universities, with development surpassing almost every goal it has set over the last 20 years. Athletics is now rolled into that, and it is a very small piece of the pie. And the donors know it and feel it.
Carolina has many big-dollar donors, no question about that. But Mack Brown knows we don’t compare to Texas, where he won a national championship and left 10 years later amidst split alumni. Here, everyone is fishing in the same relatively small pond.
The Rams Club is also among the best in the country raising money through annual dues and gifts of all sizes. But most if that jack is for scholarships and capital improvements that have been on the planning board for years. The advent of NIL is putting a squeeze on those same givers, who are also being sent surveys about what they can afford to support for a new Dean Dome.
Alumni and fans who generously helped build the Smith Center in the 1980s got what turned out to be the gift of a lifetime (or two or three). Those private-seat licenses were good for the purchasing family and at least one generation of their offspring, erasing the urgency of giving more to get more. That has left many younger alums feeling entitled and tougher to cultivate than they should be.
If an arena is built or renovated, the price tag will be at least 10 times the $36 million Dean Smith helped raise. He wanted fans to have the best seats at courtside while denying those to students. The risers put in 20 years ago hold about 400 kids.
Historically, UNC can’t cover costs of new programs like NIL the way the Alabamas, Oho States and, yes, private school Duke can. They have less competition in their home states and/or alumni in the various wealth sectors. So Carolina is left with cutting sports and selling their advertising souls, neither of which it wants to do.
Meanwhile, the fund-raising for colleges all across North Carolina will get only stronger, compared to states with far fewer D-1 schools. UNC’s search goes on, but the findings are less than obvious in this new era of college ball. Comment below.
Featured image via UNC
Art Chansky is a veteran journalist who has written ten books, including best-sellers “Game Changers,” “Blue Bloods,” and “The Dean’s List.” He has contributed to WCHL for decades, having made his first appearance as a student in 1971. His “Sports Notebook” commentary airs daily on the 97.9 The Hill WCHL and his “Art’s Angle” opinion column runs weekly on Chapelboro.Chapelboro.com does not charge subscription fees, and you can directly support our efforts in local journalism here. Want more of what you see on Chapelboro? Let us bring free local news and community information to you by signing up for our newsletter.
This challenge stems directly from NIL and will only get worse. Most college sports fans ae glad athletes get paid for the time the put into their sport and get a share of what their effort generates for the NCAA, TV, and the schools they play for. But, NIL will ultimately kill college sports and this article underscores why.
Most college athletic programs are not profitable because it takes a lot of money jus to field a team. Most of that funding comes from donors. Those same donors are likely the primary source for NIL. Many of those donors have extended what they are willing to already. To then try to tap into that same pool for NIL money makes for a very shallow pool. Schools will sstart dropping varsity sports to try to remain competitive in the “revenue” sports. Many schools that already struggle with their athletic programs will opt out of even “revenue” sports because to compete, they will need to offer NIL that they just cannot raise.
Making things worse is the pellmell way NIL has rolled out. The genie is way out of the bottle now, and the chaos will likely only get worse.
This will surely be a case of being careful what you ask for.
Some of us have said that NIL would kill college sports, and it will, as you point out. I am a fan of the college game because it fits in with the college experience. Once it becomes a “pro” game, then it no longer holds to that and I will no longer care. Multiply that “I” by the tens of thousands…
UNC has had its own version of NIL since the 80s. Now you are up in arms because the playing field has evened somewhat? UNC fans have some kinda balls. How can you complain about schools paying players legally when you have been doing it illegally ever since dean set up the Carolina way?
John, that may true of all schools including UNC. But now the money to buy/recruit players is so much more that only a few schools (and Carolina is not among them) can meet what has no ceiling.