Top-50 Largest Athletics Department Spenders

This week, BusinessofCollegeSports.com showed you the revenues, expenses and net income of athletics departments in the BCS AQ conferences.  To conclude this series, BusinessofCollegeSports.com is ranking the top-50 athletics departments with the highest revenues, expenses and net income.  In this installment, we will show you which athletics departments spend the most.

The data was obtained from the Department of Education and is from 2010-11.  While this data is not perfect, it is the only data publicly available for both public and private institutions.

School	Athletic Department Expenses	Conference
Texas	$125,978,117.00	Big 12
Ohio State	$113,184,855.00	Big Ten
Florida	$112,951,656.00	SEC
Tennessee	$102,480,757.00	SEC
Auburn	$100,497,784.00	SEC
Oklahoma	$96,274,366.00	Big 12
LSU	$96,019,689.00	SEC
Michigan	$95,836,991.00	Big Ten
Wisconsin	$92,939,345.00	Big Ten
Alabama	$92,225,560.00	SEC
Iowa	$87,607,487.00	Big Ten
Florida State	$86,946,503.00	ACC
Penn State	$84,498,339.00	Big Ten
Louisville	$83,783,719.00	Big East
South Carolina	$82,941,941.00	SEC
Georgia	$82,765,498.00	SEC
Kentucky	$81,755,641.00	SEC
Stanford	$81,125,476.00	Pac-12
Arkansas	$80,482,490.00	SEC
Minnesota	$78,924,683.00	Big Ten
Nebraska	$78,509,148.00	Big Ten
USC	$75,707,273.00	Pac-12
Notre Dame	$75,360,209.00	Big East
Virginia	$72,400,342.00	ACC
Texas A&M	$71,719,872.00	Big 12
North Carolina	$70,709,553.00	ACC
Kansas	$70,028,683.00	Big 12
Washington	$69,306,426.00	Pac-12
Oregon	$67,900,835.00	Pac-12
Michigan State	$67,450,913.00	Big Ten
Duke	$67,418,981.00	ACC
UCLA	$66,003,893.00	Pac-12
Indiana	$64,878,825.00	Big Ten
California	$64,825,171.00	Pac-12
Boston College	$64,078,272.00	ACC
Connecticut	$62,948,800.00	Big East
Clemson	$60,958,659.00	ACC
Baylor	$59,859,235.00	Big 12
Purdue	$59,293,193.00	Big Ten
Missouri	$58,862,366.00	Big 12
WVU	$58,003,719.00	Big East
Miami	$57,561,177.00	ACC
Maryland	$57,501,307.00	ACC
Virginia Tech	$56,762,362.00	ACC
Arizona	$56,750,057.00	Pac-12
Northwestern	$56,214,293.00	Big Ten
Pittsburgh	$56,044,309.00	Big East
Oklahoma State	$55,757,830.00	Big 12
Illinois	$55,723,771.00	Big Ten
Arizona State	$55,378,783.00	Pac-12

While 80 percent of the Big 12’s members ranked in the top-50 in terms of revenue generated, only 70 percent ranked in the top-50 for expenditures.  Thus, it is expected that at least several Big 12 members should generate a net income in the black.  Only four Big East members ranked in the top-50 for revenue generated.  However, five Big East members ranked in the top-5o for expenditures (Pittsburgh did not generate enough revenue to make the top-50 list, but is on the top-50 list for expenditures).  Again, every Big Ten athletics department made the top-50 list for expenditures.

The chart below depicts how many places each conference held in the list and the percentage of the conference which made the list.

Conference	# of Athletics Departments	% of Conference
ACC	9	75%
Big 12	7	70%
Big East	5	31%
Big Ten	12	100%
Pac-12	8	67%
SEC	9	75%