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Winning Games, Losing Millions: Gamecock Women’s Hoops Can’t Score Financially
This is why higher education – and its athletic programs – need to be completely privatized.
21 comments
Good article and thanks for speaking truth! Cesar Millan could probably do Staley’s job and do it better, as well as cheaper.
I work at the chicken coop and am now in my 25th year of “higher education” and am now more convinced than ever that public universities should:
1. Drop all D1 type athletics to the level seen in Europe, basically all “school teams” and “sports programs” are eliminated in favor of “Club Sports” (Interestingly enough, USC had the #1 Club Sports Ice Hockey Team this year and the #1 Club Lacrosse Team last year)
How/why did college become the minor leagues for Pro sports?!?
2. Eliminate non-STEM majors for the most part. If you want to study Russian Literature, buy a book and start reading. Art, buy an easel and start painting. Spending $120,000 (the realistic cost of an in-state degree from USC) on a degree in “gender studies” is idiotic. If you must study art or literature in college, go to Furman or Wofford.
The only non-STEM fields I would make an exception for at state schools are languages, political science, international studies and some social sciences. Every degree would require two quarters of a foreign language, a class on economics, government/Constitution taught by non-tenure track experts (Judges/accountants/lawyers).
3. The academic year should be restructured into three quarters and all the silly holidays timed to be between quarters (again, like Europe). Spring (and now Fall) break is the biggest distractor to the “learning calendar” ever invented. Google “Michalemas school year” to see how it works)
A “four-year degree” should take 9 quarters on campus and include an extra quarter or two working in industry, a semester abroad etc. as appropriate. Every college degree should require a practical application semester of some kind.
Talking about dirt dumb this country has given taxpayers money to protect billionaires for life.How about something more important about why people shouldn’t be allowed to hold the country prisoner. While they support their millionaire buddies allowing them access to citizens private information. This is easy either South Carolina will figure it out or in this country of vultures someone else will give Daly a job. That’s how it works in Amerikkka.
Well said Will, thank you for saying the truth out loud.
Just wondering if we ran the same numbers and replaced it with football versus basketball…?
I wonder, if Dawn Staley was Don Staley and took “he” our football program to consistent National levels, would we have this conversation? I mean, how many sideline coaches are making over $300K with losing seasons year after year? Or should I say decades after decades? Seriously, we have spent some money and wasted plenty; the records speak loudly.
It is all about money, and I feel sure that we have wasted a lot more than a few million here and there. Keep digging, and I am sure you will find many more numbers that prove a “loss” but will still be spent to attract and gain new talented atletes that offset the “loss”. This is big business now, and we may have our stock ticker soon enough.
Nancy, you do realize even in losing seasons USC football makes a huge profit. Who do you think funds for the women’s basketball team and every other revenue losing sport?
Nobody cares about girls playing basketball. I support my team. Root for them every game. But it’s honestly boring. If people want to see layups and bad shots they can watch middle school boys play. There is a reason girls are staying 4 years in college and boys leave early. There is more money in college for girls than in the pros. The wnba loses money every year and has since it’s conception. It’s propped up by the nba in the name of inclusion. If it stood on its on it would have been bankrupt 20 years ago.
The only people watching women’s basket ball are their wives and girlfriends.
You can tell by the jarhead comments that there are sexist bare mouth nutters responding to this article. The author so called response to the problem is to privatize. Always the solution to greedy corporations to the detriment of the athletes. Privatize for profit not for the young women. How about making parts of the game more women friendly to add excitement. Bring down the goal so they can dunk. Make the ball smaller so that they can grip better. Sports for women can be life safers just like for men and boys. No one is worried about lacrosse or rugby. I’m sure they are making tons of money. ?
They already play basketball with a smaller ball and play softball with a larger, easier to grasp ball that they pitch from much closer while playing on a much smaller field – what else you got?
silly
The women’s ball already is smaller than the men’s ball… that change happened in the 1980’s.
Quit paying that
I love our Lady Gamecocks’ program – been to mutule games this year and watched all of their March Madness games, but wow – I didn’t know it was that much of a money loser. I actually thought their ticket sales and all other revenue sources were enough to justify Staley’s salary and all the NIL costs. – or at least break even. I find it laughable when women try to cry sexism about lack of support of women’s sports – and then you ask them to name 4 WNBA stars and they can’t do it to save their life. Ask just about any average guy to name 4 NBA stars, past or present, and they can rattle off 10 without even having to think hard. The problem is that average women don’t care about sports as much as average men – they would rather spend their time and money on other things. I can understand a sports program going red for a couple of years to attract a better coach, etc., but you can’t run in the red for 10+ years off the backs of taxpayers. If that is the case here, then it needs to stop.
NOTE: The State of SC each year gives less and less money to colleges. In the 1970s SC paid about 60% of a students tuition. Today, that is less than 12%. SC has more colleges per resident than any other State. It’s ridiculous the number of State supported colleges. The CFA and USC & Clemson’s support of destroying Small College Football teams: killed college sports long before NIL. If USC supporters want to continue giving money for Semi-Professional Sports. Then let them do it. Just stop all State money going to these sports. Also, USC has one of the most indebted college sports programs in the US. It spends money on sports with zero regard to common sense. But, as long as SC Taxpayers are not on the tab for this money: go ahead, spend it. If SC Taxpayers are on the bill tab, then stop the insanity.
Not even close – Vermont, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Massachusetts and Connecticut are the top five states for colleges/universities per capita – even West Virginia with 1,700,000 hillbillies and “68 koleges” surpasses South Carolina’s schools per capita. Even in raw numbers, South Carolina, with 92 distinct colleges/universities isn’t in the top 10 for total number of schools.
When you include state supported scholarships and assorted grants etc. universities are being supported with an additional $7,000 in payments per student/year.
USC’s endowment was $952,000,000 last year – a significant portion of that came from offsets provided by the State House. Harvard on the other hand has an investment firm that manages theirs exclusively for “Havad”. They have the most f any university on earth at $51,000,000,000 (roughly the value of the endowments of the schools in 6th-10th place combined)
During the Clinton administration all the sanity checks on FFELP student loans were tossed out the door and the ceiling for permissible borrowed debt was jacked way, way up. At that point forward, the average rate of increase of public college tuition was roughly double the rate of inflation every year for the next 30 years.
All about money not the importance of graduating.half of these players aren’t any good. What’s there academic standing
Most athletes are in good academic standings… because they’re taking courses that most 7th graders could pass. What percentage of “student-athletes” are enrolled in STEM majors? The majority are enrolled in majors that will not get them a decent paying job if they even graduate. For every STEM major, you’ll have a dozen exercise sciences, sports management, sociology majors. Several of these majors are set up for online only courses so the “student-athletes” don’t even have to step foot on campus. The only time many are on campus are for practice.
Yuk. No one wants to see ugly people play sports. And by ugly I mean on the inside and outside. That coach is a repugnant racist who hates people because of her own failings. Plus, women’s basketball is a snooze fest on the whole with very limited exceptions. And for the love of God if I hear the equal pay argument again I’ll vomit.
Coach Staley runs a program that has won 3 NATIONAL championships and consistently leads the SEC in attendance. Meanwhile, the football team can’t win a conference championship. The football team constantly underperforms. So if you you pay coaches by their team’s results, Coach Staley deserves every dollar she EARNS, while Coach Beamer should be working for free.