Chansky's Notebook: Cloudy Future?

Art Chansky’s Sports Notebook is presented by The Casual Pint. YOUR place for delicious pub food paired with local beer. Choose among 35 rotating taps and 200+ beers in the cooler.

The White House celebration was a reminder of what could happen.

The Tar Heels’ field hockey and women’s tennis teams were two of the 19 NCAA champions feted at the White House this week. It was particularly symbolic because of what may lie ahead in college athletics.

If money wins out over the next ten years, there is a good chance that Olympic sports programs from across the country will harm women’s sports the most, or at least cause a giant battle in federal courts over Title IX.

Let’s just say for argument’s sake, UNC winds up in the Big Ten because that annual distribution will be close to $100 million per school by the end of the decade. At least that’s what the Big Ten and SEC are projecting.

On one hand, that may be enough to keep supporting a broad-based program, which at Carolina is women-heavy due to uneven enrollment. But the reason schools would be joining those conferences is to compete for a football championship, which would suck up a lot of that money in coaching salaries, recruiting budgets and first-class facilities every school will have to build.

UNC, on the other hand, might remain in the 15-member ACC and get, say, $50 million per year through whatever TV rights the existing league could negotiate. The shortfall compared to the schools vying for national football glory might have to be made up by cutting some of the 24 sports, most of which lose money. That would be especially punitive in Chapel Hill, where all of the so-called non-revenue sports have national profiles.

There is one other option being discussed by eight teams in the ACC, which includes Carolina. That would be to secede from the conference and form a new league, where they could escape the ACC grant of rights agreement that runs through 2036. And any distribution would be split only eight ways.

Under those scenarios, the almighty dollar will still come first, and it would be difficult for schools with 26 varsity programs to stay the same. For every woman’s team that remains, a men’s team might downgrade to a club sport because the Title IX enrollment percentages right now rules.

Sure, the White House still might honor various national champions, but the aura of football and the billions at stake is likely to dampen any parade they have. Field hockey great and rookie head coach Erin Matson has lived her dream for the last five years, but even her optimism could go down.

Her predecessor and Hall of Fame coach Karen Shelton hinted that the pressures of small budgets and rising NIL demands might make it difficult on programs like the one she built at Carolina to remain dominant — or just remain.

Featured image via UNC Athletic Communications

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Chansky’s Notebook: Cloudy Future?

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