IVAN TORRES
Special to The Leader
Over the past several months, COVID-19 has impacted the U.S. in a multitude of ways — from colleges shutting their campuses down, to people being required to wear masks in public.
But how has this contagious disease impacted collegiate sports as a whole?
First, let’s look at NCAA sports that don’t bring in revenue. These sports include swimming and diving, cross country, wrestling and track and field.
Dan Doyle, recruiting coach manager for Next College Student Athlete said for U.S. News: “A lot of those small sports that don’t generate revenue are, as we’re seeing, quick to be cut and eliminated from some of these colleges that are trying to save money.”
The U.S. News article touches on Stanford University cutting 11 team programs including men’s and women’s fencing, field hockey, lightweight rowing and men’s rowing.
Stanford University is joined by the University of Akron, Boise State, Connecticut and more.
Both women’s and men’s tennis have received the most cuts with nine Division I programs cutting men’s tennis and eight Division I programs cutting women’s tennis, according to an article for AP News.
Not only are these non-profitable sports being cut by Division I schools, they are being cut by Divisions II and III NCAA programs and the NAIA.
In fact, more Division II and III collegiate sports have been cut than Division I sports.
Now let’s look at NCAA sports that do bring in revenue for their universities.
Big, well-known conferences including the Big Ten and Pac 12, who have decided to cancel their football seasons, are losing out on a lot of money.
According to an article for the New York Post, “Rutgers faces a vanishing $49 million, while cash-cow Ohio State’s would be out $104 million and include a league-high $50 million in lost tickets alone.”
Due to the expected revenue loss, these conferences are looking to bring fall sports back in the spring.
Not only are these big Division I football teams missing out on millions of dollars, the smaller Division I programs are missing out on profit too.
Many of these smaller Division I teams take payouts against these powerhouse teams.
Unfortunately, due to these powerhouse conferences canceling their season or playing conference teams only means that smaller programs will not be receiving these payouts.
Lastly, we look at recruiting during this epidemic.
There’s a handful of high school athletes with potential who haven’t received the respect they deserve due to their senior seasons being taken from them.
This makes it hard for coaches to recruit because it’s a whole year of game footage that they’re missing out on.
Why does that matter? We’ve seen plenty of athletes such as Patrick Mahomes and Lamar Jackson who have shown significant progression in one year.
However, we have also witnessed players like Baker Mayfield and Tim Tebow who have one amazing season and then never live up to those expectations again.
Due to COVID-19, many colleges have had to make several adjustments to their sports programs.
Hopefully these adjustments aren’t long-term and we return to witnessing that collegiate athletic atmosphere that is loved by many.