SBJ Unpacks: The crossroads of sports business in America

Tonight in Unpacks: In a look at the top sports markets in the U.S., SBJ’s David Broughton analyzes what makes Indianapolis such a hotbed of business activity, from its venues and visitor capacity to its variety of amateur events and pro teams.

Also tonight:

• ESPN/ABC sports programming having best first half since 2016
• Sources: Big 12 won’t add Memphis despite significant pitch
• AAC officially rebrands to the American Conference
• Op-ed: Two models offer different paths for future of college sports

Listen to SBJ’s most popular podcast, Morning Buzzcast, where Joe Lemire kicks off the week with the gesture of solidarity and strength from WNBA players during All-Star weekend, Scottie Scheffler playing the most dominant golf since Tiger Woods’ peak, JC Tretter’s departure from the NFLPA and more.

Patrick Talty knew that having an event-hosting résumé dating back more than a century wasn’t enough to propel Indianapolis into the next generation of business.

He had started his career in the early 2000s as an executive at the Indiana Convention Center and RCA Dome, before holding leadership positions, at various periods from 2006 to 2019, at State Farm Stadium, Zayed Sports City in Abu Dhabi, U.S. Bank Stadium and WWE. He returned to Indianapolis in 2019 when he was named COO of the Indianapolis Sports Corp.

When he was interviewing for the president’s role in 2022, he knew it was time to look ahead. Talty was elected president of the ISC three years ago this week.

“I had seen the way Indianapolis did things,” he said. “Then I saw how others did things. They were not the ‘Indy’ way. I believed that we needed to think differently about our sports ecosystem and look ahead 10 years.”

The ISC, the country’s oldest sports commission (founded in 1979), hired business consultants Next Practice Partners to come up with a strategy.

“Their strategy right off the bat was, ‘Why 10 years? Why not 25 years?’” he said.

The group spent nearly two years talking to and surveying more than 100 of its partners and stakeholders, Indiana residents and even properties that had not held their events in Indianapolis to get their feedback on sports’ impact in the state.

From this research came the 2050 Vision, its guiding principles and five pillars of focus.

Additionally, Talty said, the entire city and state changed their mentality from viewing sports as an economic segment that generates an economic impact to an investment that generates long-term economic development.

Everyone in the region is considered a stakeholder, from high-level executives at the hotels, restaurants, airport, pro and college teams and sports national governing bodies, as well as those at public works and government, sports venues, destination marketers and other sectors who meet on a monthly basis to share calendars, best practices and to strategize on how each specific event can generate future economic growth for the region.

The collaboration is loosely called “Team Indy,” and industry veterans say that there is nothing like it in the sports business world.

“The ecosystem is multigenerational,” said Sarah Myer, Indiana Sports Corp chief of staff and strategy. “It feels less like a job and more like a responsibility to the century of people before us.”

Hoosier Hospitality

One of Team Indy’s top objectives is to make one of the country’s busiest sports calendars even busier.

The city rolled out the red carpet this past weekend for its first WNBA All-Star Game, extending an 18-month stretch that included winning the bids to host the 2024 NBA All-Star Game; the most lucrative WWE Royal Rumble ever; the historic U.S. Olympic Swimming Trials at Lucas Oil Stadium; landing eight major Big Ten championships through 2028, which will generate a projected 125,128 hotel room nights (including an extension of the league’s football championship game through 2028, where it has been played since the 2011 inaugural game); the NFHS/NCAA/SFIA Team Sports Conference and many other events.

The region’s event-hosting skills generated a record $17 million in operating revenue and $24 million in revenue last year from various taxes on lodging, car rental, event tickets and other sources, according to the annual comprehensive financial report completed last month by the region’s Capital Improvement Board (CIB).

The CIB, a public body that was created by the Indiana General Assembly in 1965 to “finance, construct, operate, and maintain capital facilities or improvements,” uses that revenue to help fund the marketing, bidding and hosting efforts of Visit Indy, Indiana Sports Corp and the Indianapolis Convention Center. The organization owns Lucas Oil Stadium, Gainbridge Fieldhouse, Victory Field and the Indiana Convention Center. The Indiana Pacers and Indianapolis Colts practice facilities are also located on land owned by the CIB, and there are similar agreements in place for the Indiana Fever’s under-construction training center and the proposed new MLS stadium.

To complement the earmarked tax revenue, the CIB in 2015 established a bid fund to assist with those efforts, where $4.88 million had been disbursed through the end of 2024 and there was $6.5 million in reserve. Additionally, the state’s Office of Entrepreneurship and Innovation last month approved a two-year extension to the 2-year-old Statewide Sports and Tourism Bid Fund, meaning that $20 million will have been pledged by the state to bring in new events over four years. At least 30% of those must occur outside Marion County.

“We have a bright red state house and a bright blue city,” said Kevin Lennon, NCAA senior vice president of policy and governance, the organization’s longest-tenured employee, who began his career in April 1986 before the NCAA moved to town from the Kansas City area. “But this state and city are partisan when it comes to sports business.”

Indianapolis Mayor Joe Hogsett is a Democrat, and the state’s governor, Mike Braun, is a Republican whose party has maintained a supermajority in the state Senate since 2010 and in the House since 2012. All pull for sports.

Approximately two dozen states have a fund or grant to help destination marketing organizations attract and/or operate sporting events, according to data provided to Sports Business Journal by Stoll Strategies.

The region’s event-hosting chassis was built, of course, by the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and the Indy 500. The sports industry knows that the 500 is the most-attended single-event weekend in the world, but natives are even quicker to point out that the spectacle is twice as old as the Super Bowl and draws far more out-of-towners. The inaugural Indianapolis 500 in 1911 drew an estimated crowd of 80,000 to 85,000 spectators (in a county of 263,000). This year’s race day drew nearly 350,000 fans, more than five times the 65,719 that attended February’s Super Bowl LIX at Caesars Superdome.

Additionally, the Class AAA Indianapolis Indians are the second-oldest minor league team in the country, having played continuously since 1902.

“We’ve been moving traffic for more than 100 years,” exclaimed Visit Indy’s executive vice president and CMO, Chris Gahl, who oversees the non-private, nonprofit’s budget of more than $12 million to market the region as an event destination.

Looking ahead, a record 251,523 hotel room nights were booked in 2024 that were directly related to future sporting events, according to Visit Indy, as the region is preparing to host (among other things) the NCAA 2026 and 2029 men’s and 2028 women’s basketball Final Fours; a WrestleMania and a two-night SummerSlam, as part of a first-of-its-kind partnership struck between WWE and Indiana Sports Corp earlier this year; and TEDSports Indianapolis, which will explore the intersection of technology, creativity and the human potential in sports.

Additionally, through a 30-year agreement formalized in 2009, Indianapolis hosts at least one major NCAA event every year to 2039, including 90% of its committee meetings.

Everything, Everyone is Connected

To accommodate growing numbers of visiting fans, the city continues to build on the physical infrastructure that boasts all the major sports venues within walking distance of each other and one of the most extensive networks of skywalks on the continent. When the Signia by Hilton opens next fall, for example, there will be 12 hotels connected via skywalk to the convention center, for a total of more than 5,100 rooms (see map above), plus an underground connector that extends to Lucas Oil Stadium. Another skywalk will connect Gainbridge Fieldhouse to the Pacers Sports & Entertainment’s under-construction site that will include a 170-room Shinola Hotel and a 4,000-capacity music venue operated by Live Nation, scheduled to open in 2027.

And, of course, in a city that was purposely designed to keep residents and visitors connected, the historical influence of the world’s most-attended single-day sporting event seeps into every facet of the economy.

“We all understand what came first,” said the Capital Improvement Board’s Andy Mallon, who has been the organization’s executive director since 2019, and holds a law degree at IU. “The sports teams all lean on each other, but the whole city leans into the 500.”

Building a Tech Hub

Since launching the nonprofit Sports Tech HQ in 2021, Jeff Hintz and Brian Alkire have assembled a collective of more than 50 companies, evenly spilt between what head of marketing Alkire said “were homegrown companies that joined the collective because they already had a significant presence here,” and the other half were lured by the accelerated growth of tech companies in the region.

mayflower box here

Sports Tech HQ is helping develop the Research & Development HUB at Grand Park, the training home of the Colts, Pacers and USL Championship Indy Eleven.

“Our goal is to future-proof the state by stopping the brain drain of innovators and connecting everyone to everyone,” said Hintz, vice president of innovation at ISC and executive director of Sports Tech HQ.

The latest addition to the collective is Edge Sound Research, which this summer signed a tech partnership with Indiana University, installed its multisensorial sound technology at Gainbridge Fieldhouse and IMS, and earlier this month raised $2.75 million in another round of funding, which included participation by USTA Ventures and the DeVos family (the majority owners of the Orlando Magic).

The Women’s Sports Capital

“Caitlin [Clark] is the accelerator, but Indianapolis has supported women’s sports for a long time,” said ISC’s Myer, noting that the city just hosted its 26th Big Ten women’s basketball tournament, and that Mel Raines (president and CEO of Pacers Sports & Entertainment), Allison Melangton (senior vice president of Penske Entertainment) and Allison Barber (executive leader and chair of the Marvella Foundation, the organization behind the under-development Marvella Sports Complex) are among the many executive-level women running local sports properties.

“Herb Simon is the unsung hero of the Fever,” said Raines of the longtime Pacers and Fever owner. “He invested in women’s sports 26 years ago, and he never once stopped believing.”

The Fever were the first WNBA team to have their own dedicated space within an NBA arena, and PS&E is now building the club a stand-alone $78 million practice and training facility on the Gainbridge Fieldhouse site.

The $98 million Marvella Sports Complex, overseen by Barber, who is also the former president of the Fever, is the country’s first leadership and sports complex specifically for young female athletes. It is located in Fair Oaks Farms, Ind., about two hours from Indianapolis. The 300,000-square-foot facility will feature 16 courts and fields, has a formal partnership with Sports Tech HQ and this summer received a financial grant from the WNBA All-Star 2025 Host Committee.

Additionally, the Portland, Ore.-based Sports Bra, a bar that is dedicated to showing only women’s athletics on its TVs, announced last month that it will open an Indianapolis location.

And Room to Grow

The city has long marketed itself as the Amateur Sports Capital of the World, thanks to the presence of the NCAA, the National Federation of State High School Associations, USA Track & Field, USA Gymnastics and USA Football. But the goal is to be home to “the largest cluster of sports organizations and governing bodies in the world,” according to Talty.

“How do we attract businesses to our state?” asked Talty. “For example, we are home to the second-most sports NGBs in the country. How do we get more? By completely surrounding them with leaders who are here now.”

The initiative also focuses on building sports business academic and research opportunities. For example, Purdue’s motorsports engineering program (which includes a five-year dual degree in motorsports and mechanical engineering) will be housed inside the U.S. headquarters of Dallara, the largest multinational Italian race car manufacturer, beginning later next month.

Located one mile from the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, students will get hands-on training and diagnostic testing alongside working designers and engineers. Dallara’s portfolio includes being the exclusive chassis supplier of the NTT IndyCar Series since 2012; the designer of the Next Gen car (Gen-7) for the NASCAR Cup Series; and the manufacturer of the Cadillac and BMW Le Mans Daytona Hypercar prototype for IMSA (International Motor Sports Association).

“Indy doesn’t have casinos or palm trees or beaches,” said Lennon. “But we sure can host an event.”

Forward Progress

• The Indiana Convention Center is undergoing its sixth expansion, adding 143,500 square feet including a 50,000-square-foot ballroom connected to the new 800-room Signia by Hilton. And a massive expansion of Grand Park, one of the country’s busiest youth sports facilities, will begin this fall that will include the construction of a 10,000-seat stadium, an ice skating facility that will be the largest in the state, numerous hotels and business space.
• MLS Commissioner Don Garber visited Indianapolis again this spring, and the city has earmarked about 16 acres for construction of a new MLS stadium at the site of the Indianapolis Downtown Heliport for a proposed expansion team, and is working with Populous on the design. “It would help us attract international residents and companies, it would help the companies here attract talent, fill a void in our facilities offering,” said Talty.
• The Caitlin Effect: Average attendance in the Fever’s 33 home games since Clark joined the team was 16,952 as of press time, up 129% over the average of the 375 regular-season home games the club played since its debut in 2000-01. She has marketing deals with Indy-based Gainbridge and Lilly, and the city sees a spike in hotel room revenue for every Fever home game.
• The region’s swimming business is booming. Last month, USA Swimming awarded Indianapolis its 2028 Olympic Team Trials leading into the Olympic Games in Los Angeles. The 2024 trials at Lucas Oil Stadium broke the sport’s records for attendance (more than 285,000 fans across all sessions) and generated significant exposure for the city. Additionally, the Toyota National Championships returned to the IU Natatorium last month, and a $55 million expansion and renovation of the Carmel High School natatorium 30 minutes north of downtown Indianapolis was completed in December. The facility meets or exceeds FINA and USA Swimming standards, and was recently selected to host the first leg of the 2025 World Aquatics Swimming World Cup in October.
• TWG Motorsports, a racing portfolio that includes Indianapolis-based Andretti Global (IndyCar) and Wayne Taylor Racing (IMSA), is the owner of the Cadillac Formula 1 team scheduled to join the grid next year as the only U.S.-based team. The team’s 400,000-square-foot headquarters is under construction, and Keanu Reeves is producing and narrating a documentary on the team’s birth. TVG’s CEO is Dan Towriss and longtime motorsports executive Jill Gregory is COO, as well as president of Andretti Global — because, once again, everything in Indy is connected.
• IU broke ground in February on the $110 million James T. Morris Arena. The 4,500 seats will give the city a smaller marketable venue not currently provided in the downtown area, and will serve as the headquarters for USA Track & Field.
• Indianapolis has hosted every NFL Combine since 1987 and is locked in for next year. But even though the city has won every bid since 2021, the league began soliciting bids from other cities to host the annual pre-draft event, so nothing is guaranteed beyond 2026. “Every time we host an event, we treat it like we are auditioning for the next one,” Myer said.

Better call Mayflower!

Indianapolis Colts (in Indy since 1984) — Baltimore (1953)

Note: If you have to ask …

NCAA (1999) — Overland Park, Kan. (1952)

Note: In 1997, Indy was chosen over Atlanta, Dallas, Denver, Houston, Phoenix, Kansas City, Orlando and San Antonio to be the NCAA’snew headquarters.

National Federation of State High School Associations (2000) — Kansas City (1979)

Note: The 105-year-old organization leads 8 million athletes at nearly 20,000 schools across all 50 states and the District of Columbia.

Corteva (2022) — Wilmington, Del. (2018)

Note: The agricultural chemical and seed company last fall signed a 10-year, $4 million deal for naming rights to the Indiana State Fairgrounds & Event Center, home to the IU Indianapolis men’s and women’s basketball teams.

Lucas Oil (2024) — Corona, Calif. (1989)

Note: CEO Morgan Lucas is a former pro drag racer and the Lucas Oil Indianapolis Raceway Park is about 10 miles northwest of downtown Indianapolis.

ai.io (2025) — London (2017)

Note: The AI-powered sports analytics company, with more than 50 professional club, collegiate and NGBs on its roster, announced this spring that Indy would be its U.S. home.

Sportable (2025) — London (2015)

Note: The company known for its ball and player tracking technologies recently selected Indy as the location for its North American Innovation Center.

ESPN programming is seeing a viewership increase through the first half of the year, with the flagship cable network up 4% in total-day audience and 9% in primetime. When sports on ABC are factored in, the combined entities are up 1% and at the best point halfway through the year since 2016.

ESPN’s total-day average on its own (based on a 24-hour window) is 712,000 viewers, which is the cable network’s second-best figure since 2017 for this halfway point. For 183 nights of primetime, ESPN is averaging 1.9 million viewers, which is the best mark since 2014.

Across sports programming on ESPN and ABC, there have been 254 billion minutes consumed, which is the best first half of a year since 2016. Looking across each of ESPN’s Nielsen-rated channels and platforms, there have been over 300 billion minutes watched.

Memphis might be seeking a path into the Power Four, but the Big 12 is unlikely to be the route.

Multiple league sources with direct knowledge of the situation told Sports Business Journal that Memphis approached the conference with a pitch to become its 17th member in recent weeks.

Big 12 presidents met on Monday to discuss the matter following a regularly scheduled call among the league’s ADs last week. The presidents did not hold a vote on Monday and instead decided against moving forward with the proposal, sources told SBJ.

“Memphis is flattered any time we’re mentioned in realignment,” Memphis AD Ed Scott told SBJ. “Our name has been mentioned a few times, but we have not received any formal offers from any conference.”

Memphis’ push to join the Big 12 hinged on not only receiving no annual conference media distribution in the immediate future, but also with the promises of helping bring significant corporate sponsorship interest for the league through companies like AutoZone and Lowe’s, sources told SBJ.

The corporate promises were expected to be worth around $200M or more over the next five years, sources said, while individual school distribution would’ve been worth roughly $2.3M annually.

Sources also detailed an exit provision that would’ve allowed for Memphis’ television value to the league to be evaluated around 2031 -- coinciding with the expiration of the current Big 12 media deal with Fox and ESPN. At that time, the league could functionally determine whether to 1) give Memphis a full share of the conference’s media distribution based on whatever new deal might come about; 2) provide an appropriate payout reflective of the school’s value to the new TV deal and its terms; or 3) Memphis and the Big 12 could amicably split at that time.

The impetus for the provision was to essentially provide both Memphis and the league flexibility given the changing landscape of college football.

Memphis received just over $11M in revenue share from the American Conference last year, while an exit fee from the league would likely cost the school a minimum of $25M.

AutoZone is also headquartered in the city and has been a title sponsor of the Liberty Bowl -- played at Memphis’ home football stadium -- since 2004.

Lowe’s, while based in North Carolina, is headed by Memphis grad Marvin Ellison, the company’s chairman, president and CEO. The company had also previously been involved in the Big 12’s exploration of conference naming rights.

SBJ reached out to AutoZone and Lowe’s for comment, but those requests were not returned at the time of publication.

Big 12 ADs discussed Memphis’ candidacy during a regularly scheduled call last week, while the league’s presidents met on Monday to sift through options -- ultimately deciding not to move forward in considering the proposal.

In order to add a new school to the league, 12 of the 16 Big 12 presidents would have to approve the motion.

Sources within the Big 12 had been pessimistic the conference would ultimately approve Memphis as a new member ahead of Monday’s presidential meeting.

One league source gave Memphis’ efforts “a 5% chance” of approval. A second Big 12 source said, “there’s a less than 50% chance -- I don’t see more than a 20-25% chance of it going through.”

Stakeholders in the league had soured on Memphis in recent days despite the massive sponsorship promises for myriad reasons, including the school being hit with penalties related to findings from an NCAA investigation that were released on Wednesday.

The NCAA found a Memphis academic counselor paid two softball players to provide test answers and complete assignments for an unnamed men’s basketball player between late January and mid-February 2024. The school was put on probation for two years and fined $30,000 by as a result of the findings.

Sources in the Big 12 also had mild concerns around the complications of scheduling with 17 members, versus an even 16 in its current form, and that it might eventually necessitate adding an 18th member down the line.

“If we didn’t take them when we took Cincinnati, BYU, UCF and Houston, why now?” queried a third Big 12 source.

The approach Memphis has taken with its pitch isn’t completely novel, but does represent a more aggressive effort in attempting to join the Power Four.

SMU is the most tangible example of spending big and taking a significant cut in order to make the leap to the highest rungs of major college football.

The deep-pocketed private school located in Dallas agreed to join the ACC as part of the latest swath of realignment by taking no media revenue for nine years, while boosters have planned to foot the bill in the interim to keep the Mustangs competitive.

Those efforts paid off almost immediately after SMU won the ACC regular season title and reached the College Football Playoff despite falling to Clemson in the league championship game.

“I think if you would have told anybody going into Year 1 in the ACC that we would go undefeated in conference and play for a championship and be in the College Football Playoff, probably people wouldn’t have believed you or said, ‘That’s a heck of a year,’” SMU head coach Rhett Lashlee said following his squad’s first round CFP loss to Penn State in December.

The push for a seat at the Power Four table also comes amid the perceived ticking time bomb college sports leaders have circled in the early 2030s when, as noted, the Big 12 media deal nears expiration, while exit fees in the ACC drop to a manageable $75M -- a change that came through a settlement between the league, Florida State and Clemson.

Tim Pernetti’s first address as commissioner at American Athletic Conference media days last year included the use of the word “brand” seven times.

Pernetti, who’s seen college sports from a variety of different seats, including as the athletic director at Rutgers and president of IMG Academy, made clear he wanted those in his league to consider thinking about it differently.

“We all understand that growing our brand ultimately drives value for member institutions, their programs and student athletes,” he said at the time. “And that is our goal.”

That goal may well be within reach.

The American will officially roll out a sleek rebrand this week when Pernetti takes the stage for his second annual address at the conference’s media days in Charlotte.

The league will be referred to officially as the “American Conference” and just the “American” on second reference. There is no official shorthand anymore (particularly one that might be confused with, say, a certain Power Four conference).

“When you say, ‘build your brand,’ people are like, ‘What the hell does that mean?’” Pernetti quipped. “To me, a brand is more than a name. It can’t just be a name. A brand is more than a name. You have to define who you are. You have to define what you stand for, what the tenets are. You establish your values, and then you’ve got to live them every single day.”

The name shift may feel like semantics, but there are layers to changes that’ve percolated at conference HQ in Irving, Texas, since the early days of Pernetti’s tenure, which officially began in June 2024.

RELATED: Tim Pernetti plans to ‘break some glass’ in new era of college sports

The American’s rebrand marks a consequential shift for a conference that made its hay occupying the gray area somewhere between the Power Four and Group of Five in the college sports pecking order in redefining how it operates and presents itself.

“We’re facing an unprecedented and pivotal moment in intercollegiate athletics, but our conference views it as an opportunity to be bold, strategic and aggressive in terms of shaping our own future as a league,” said East Carolina Chancellor Philip Rogers, chairman of the search committee that brought Pernetti on as commissioner. “Part of doing that is being able to communicate that vision, mission and set of core values in a way that resonates with the public and really depicts what we’ve been doing for many years now.”

“When you say, ‘build your brand,’ people are like, ‘What the hell does that mean?’ To me, a brand is more than a name. It can’t just be a name. A brand is more than a name. You have to define who you are.”

—  Tim Pernetti, AAC commissioner

The rebrand has been in the works for much of the past year. Pernetti tapped marketing and brand communication firm Anachel and its CEO Carrie Cecil, a 2022 SBJ Game Changer, to lead a brand evaluation process.

The league’s athletic directors and presidents were further cued in on the work during spring meetings last month in Florida, and the public will get a broader taste over the course of the coming week.

While the conference’s name will draw the bulk of the headlines, there are myriad prongs to the revamp. A new tagline — “Built to rise” — will be featured in varying branding and commercials in coming days and months. A new commercial for the league, too, is set to debut to bring broader awareness of the changes.

The American is also slated to reveal its first conference mascot, “Soar the Eagle.” The mascot is fun, sure, but it’s also another branding play that paves the way for fan engagement, merchandise and interactive content as a monetizable character.

Pernetti noted social channels will be attributed to Soar and it will be incorporated into the league’s content. He also teased a potential mascot seven-on-seven football game down the line.

“It‘s another extension of our brand as something that will have broader appeal to a broader audience,” Pernetti said. “Is it something that’s going to be potentially controversial, because no conferences do this. I actually don’t care. I like the fact that it’s innovative and it lines up directly with our tenet of innovation.”

There’s something poetic about Pernetti being the man guiding the American through this overhaul. As Rutgers AD, he moved the Scarlet Knights away from the American for the Big Ten over a decade ago.

Now leading the conference he once departed, Pernetti hasn’t exactly been shy about pressing forward amid a shifting college athletics landscape.

He pushed for a measure that was approved by the league’s presidents earlier this year that will require member institutions to put at least $10 million total toward revenue sharing with athletes by 2027-28, following the approval of the House settlement.

Pernetti also pushed for a shift in the league’s basketball unit distribution within the conference. Rather than divide units among each member institution, those schools that earn them will receive the full value of the NCAA Tournament units they earn in a given postseason, via the following year’s conference distribution.

The American, too, rolled up its commercial business assets to create American RISE Ventures in May.

“It’s a league that is a remarkable success story,” Charlotte AD Mike Hill said. “Tim has come in and really ignited our approach moving forward to so many different areas. He’s not one to sit still. He wants to be at the forefront of really every area of college athletics when it comes to our conference.”

The rebrand marks another step in the league’s evolution — one Pernetti and the conference hope creates more value down the line.

“As member institutions, we’re not in the same neighborhood financially as some of the autonomy conferences,” Pernetti conceded. “But make no mistake about it — that doesn’t mean we have a different expectation to compete and generate revenue and play at the highest level. That’s just going to take grit. It’s going to take courage to do some things like this that I think will turn a lot of heads.”

College athletics is undergoing a seismic shift. NIL, the transfer portal and the recent House v. NCAA settlement have propelled Power Four programs representing about 13,000 football and men’s basketball players — just 2.5% of all NCAA student athletes — into a professionalized orbit. If all Power Four programs maximize revenue sharing (most will), then these institutions will share approximately $20 billion of their $100 billion-plus sports-driven entertainment revenues over the next decade.

But what about the other 97.5% of student athletes? Or the millions in high school who never make a college roster? They’re still passionate and competing, yet increasingly sidelined in a “future of college athletics” conversation focusing on the few.

Football and men’s basketball in large Division I conferences are on a one-way path to professional sports economics and compensation, and that progress should be celebrated. But as a few sports generate and share entertainment revenue streams, many athletic departments are left with tough choices, and too often, a knee-jerk reaction is to consider cutting into Olympic sports as a solution.

Right now, at universities around the country, the first question too often is, “Should we cut?”

What if the right starting question is, “Should we add?”

We believe the future of college sports lies in a dual model. The first model is “One for the Few,” and it encompasses professional sports economics and self-funded, revenue-generating entertainment sports. The second is “One for the Many,” and it includes scalable and profitable models that rely on education revenue streams, primarily tuition, institutionally governed Olympic sports programs that expand access, and are sustainably funded by a blend of tuition-paying and scholarship student athletes.

The “One for the Few” model is taking shape and will continue to mature over time. Meanwhile, the “One for the Many” model isn’t about creating new methods from scratch -- it’s about reimagining and scaling existing pathways to welcome more student athletes. By adding more tuition-paying student athletes, schools will undoubtedly improve their profitability and leverage their valuable existing facilities, assets, school brands, sports facilities, coaching and administrative talent.

There are two simple and immediate ways to add student athletes within universities’ control, and a third that would require NCAA rule changes: (1) Add to existing NCAA-sanctioned varsity rosters; (2) Reimagine and bring back junior varsity (JV) teams that can play high-level, non-NCAA-sanctioned competition; and (3) Adjust NCAA rules to allow universities to have multiple teams in the same sport competing at multiple divisions (e.g., Clemson could have D-I, D-II and D-III baseball teams).

There is undoubtedly significant demand for this product from incoming freshmen if a handful of conditions are met: JV or lower-division students have moderate access to varsity facilities and opportunities to play, train and be a part of the varsity operation; JV or lower-division students have lighter (approximately 50%) of the required training time, with options to do more; JV or lower-division students have ability to (occasionally) earn varsity promotion; JV students achieve university admission via the same sports recruiting process as the varsity athletes. This would empower coaches to develop a farm system, develop a more loyal, cohesive roster and make them less reliant on the transfer portal.

Student athletes, many eager and able to pay for participation, could become the growth engine that preserves and expands Olympic sports, not through entertainment revenue subsidies but through profitable tuition growth. Adding more athletes also provides taxpayers and university donors with a greater return on the $100 billion-plus they have invested in varsity facilities, which are currently utilized at only 20%-30% of capacity.

This “add more” mentality demands leaders who embrace a new lens on college sports and have a growth mentality focused on expanding opportunities, rather than maintaining their old model and cutting their way out.

We are already seeing university leaders doing both. On the negative side, one Power Four university recently eliminated approximately 150 varsity spots and downgraded several Olympic sports to club status in a “roster reset.” On the positive side, under President Rick McCullough, Florida State University introduced women’s lacrosse, and the University of South Florida, under President Rhea Law, added beach volleyball and lacrosse teams.

As universities compete for differentiated education, talent, culture and tuition, adding more athletes will prove to be a winning formula.

University leaders may wonder if there’s enough demand from tuition-paying families to add to existing varsity rosters and to add JV teams. The private market has already answered. Families spend over $30 billion annually on youth sports, and demand is growing. Nearly 8 million U.S. high school students, representing over 50% of all high school students, participate in sports. Fewer than 7% go on to compete in college. That leaves millions of driven and disciplined student athletes without a path forward, not because they’re unqualified, but because we haven’t created pathways for them. The result is a significant imbalance between supply and demand in the market.

The only question is, will higher education seize or miss the opportunity to create new solutions for the largest “affinity group” entering college each year, high school student athletes?

Now is the time to expand where it matters most. To realign college athletics around a dual mission, the future belongs to the schools that open more doors for the many, not just write bigger checks to the few.

A more detailed framework is already circulating in universities and gaining momentum. It outlines a path to maximize existing varsity rosters and introduces a JV model, accompanied by a clear action plan that any university can implement immediately.

Drew Weatherford is a serial entrepreneur and investor, a co-founder of Weatherford Capital and Collegiate Athletic Solutions, and a former starting quarterback at Florida State University. Brent Richard is a career investor and operator in sports and education business, the CEO of IMG Academy, and a former D-I soccer player.

• Sephora is the presenting sponsor of this week’s AUSL Championship Series, a best-of-three event Saturday-Monday in Tuscaloosa, Ala., reports SBJ’s Mike Mazzeo.
• The College Basketball Crown is slated for a return, with Fox Sports and AEG holding the second edition April 1-5 in Las Vegas, sources told SBJ’s Ben Portnoy. It will air on Fox and FS1.
• NESN released an updated version of its direct-to-consumer streaming service powered by Viewlift, notes SBJ’s Mike Mazzeo.
• Agency conglomerate Underdog & Co. is continuing its expansion with the acquisition of L.A.-based experiential/event agency BeCore, writes SBJ’s Terry Lefton.
• The Kraken are hosting the annual NHL Club Business Meetings this week, reports SBJ’s Alex Silverman, with an all-time high of more than 1,300 representatives from the league’s 32 clubs and league office expected to attend.