How could the impending House settlement affect non-revenue sports at Auburn?
It’s no secret that major changes are imminent in college athletics.
That’s been a theme for the past four years since student athletes were able to begin profiting off their Name, Image and Likeness in the summer of 2021. Now, with the impending House vs. NCAA settlement that would resolve a number of antitrust lawsuits against the NCAA, even more revenue is likely coming student athletes’ way.
The settlement includes a revenue sharing plan that will allow schools to begin paying student athletes as soon as next school year, with each school distributing as much as $20.5 million to its athletes.
Those new expenses for athletics departments create a need for significant budgetary adjustments. Those adjustments can mean cuts in certain areas, with some schools, such as Indiana University, already eliminating various athletic department positions.
“If the settlement happens, we will probably be spending around 23, $24 million that we’ve never budgeted before,” Auburn athletic director John Cohen said in an interview with AL.com. “Where does that come from? Well, it comes from us tightening our bell a little bit. It comes from trying to create new revenue sources. It comes from, you know, donor support all of our programs. It comes from just being committed to trying to figure it out.”
One concern that exists for schools across the country under the new revenue sharing model is the future of non-revenue sports.
At Auburn, the school has seen success in sports such as gymnastics and track and field, but Cohen acknowledged the uncertain future for those sports.
“This is kind of how capitalism works, something creates a lot of revenue, it gets a lot of attention. It funds other things,” Cohen said. “Does it take away from opportunities, from sports that don’t create revenue? That’s not our goal at Auburn. We want every student athlete to have a terrific experience.
“We want to provide them the things that are necessary for them to have a great experience,” Cohen continued. “But I just believe, moving forward, that the amount of bright, shiny and new that Olympic sports have experienced over the last 10-15, years, it would stand to reason that that will diminish.”
When asked point blank if the new model could bring cuts to certain sports, Cohen said that’s “not the direction we want to go,” but said it’s “impossible” to answer that question with all the uncertainty that looms.
Either way, budgetary changes and cuts will be required to adapt to the new revenue sharing model. However, whether that comes in specific sports or other areas of the athletic department is, at Auburn, still unknown.
Auburn won’t come into this new era hurting, though. The athletic department reported $194,360,814 in revenue for Fiscal Year 2024, including a $2.8 million net surplus.
Cohen also told AL.com that the department has been preparing for an uncertain financial future all the way back to when he was in discussion for the AD job in 2022.
“When Chris Roberts came to speak to me about this position, I would say about 70% of all of our discussions were about the future of NIL, the future of how student athletes are going to be compensated,” Cohen said, “Whether that’s future scholarship aid or name, image and likeness opportunity.”
For now, the uncertainty remains, and the future of non-revenue sports remains murky, even for high-profile athletic departments such as Auburn’s.
Peter Rauterkus covers Auburn sports for AL.com. You can follow him on X at @peter_rauterkus or email him at [email protected]m
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