The Sooners 3rd tier media deal, is set to be renewed by 2022...
The latest insight from Oklahoma athletic director Joe Castiglione, gives an idea of how thoughts of this crisis has impacted the university:
Castiglione: Financial impact will be felt 'in a noticeable way'
Joey HelmerSTAFF
Posted on Apr 14th, 12:37 AM, , User Since 136 months ago, User Post Count: 0
Apr 14th, 12:37 AM
136 months
NORMAN, Okla. — Iowa State and Louisville are a couple of schools that have already made budget and pay cuts in their athletic departments to deal with the financial implications of COVID-19. Oklahoma may not be that far behind.
“Some of them are taking short-term action. Some are long-term,” Castiglione said. “Any and everything you could consider as a possibility is on the table.” What’s certain are economic repercussions from the ongoing crisis. Castiglione said it “would be grossly naïve” to assume otherwise.
“It’s a moving target,” Castiglione said. “I think at a minimum it’s going to impact us in a noticeable way. Can I put a percentage on it right now? I hesitate to do that because it would just be a guess because I don’t know the rest of the equation, and nor do you, nor does anyone. If I had a crystal ball, we might be able to get closer to quantifying that.”
The Sooners have already accounted for their share of revenue losses from the cancellation of the NCAA men’s and women’s basketball tournaments, a figure of $375 million that won’t be distributed. Now they’re simply bracing and preparing for what may be next. “We’re just hoping to minimize it because one doesn’t know,” Castiglione said. “This affects the economy of all those that support our athletic program or programs or universities or the businesses that are affected. I just read something today where unemployment is now at 10%. That’s a large number for our country. And so we start to see that, and not sure whether how much more that’s going to grow. Experts are telling us it’s going to grow. So it’s anybody’s guess how much higher that grows.
“But you can’t look at those kinds of things and ignore the possibility that it will impact us to some degree. So that’s why I hesitate to say we’re taking this step or that step right now, because it’s not really completely certain what one would base it on. We might take a step that may sound good for a sound byte, but it might fall woefully short of where we need to be. And so we will announce those steps as we feel it’s appropriate and prudent.”
Castiglione has dealt with similar situations before, be it the 2008 financial crisis, fluctuating energy prices, which he labeled as events that are “national in nature, sometimes statewide in nature and sometimes campus wide in nature.” Yet, he again reiterated as in recent days that this is unprecedented. “This is way beyond anybody’s imagination,” Castiglione said. “I was telling somebody the other day I feel like we’re living one of those movies that we rent to watch, and the storyline and the cinematography and the drama and whatever emotions that really hit, and then the movie would end and you get up and walk out of the theatre and realize, ‘Wow, that was quite a story, but it was just a movie.’
“This one we are living day-to-day and we still don’t know exactly if we are a fourth of the way through it, halfway through it, three-fourths of the way through it. We don’t know.”
Like he said, there are simply a lot of moving parts. Castiglione, though, did report some good news, noting that just more than 70% of donors and ticketholders have renewed for the 2020 season.
“That’s positive,” Castiglione said. “But I also realize it may be a while before we know how much or how many of the other 30% decides they can renew. So we’re grateful. We’re thankful for all of them. We’re constantly talking to them, interacting with them, and I think, if anything, we’re building stronger relationships.”
These trying times continue to make forecasting difficult. The uncertainty continues, although the one certainty is things are quite a bit different right now.
In my opinion, it makes it more likely that Oklahoma will look to stay with as many rivals (long term, as well as preserve UT game as a league event), & could still include adding USC, etc...
Oklahoma/ Texas, are 2 of most solvent athletic departments, but the same can't be said for Washington/Oregon/California/USC/UCLA/Arizona/Arizona State/Colorado, who need XII now...
The idea of "doubling down" in losing tv revenues, along with cutting into donors & ticketholders in giving games that have no history, vs that of (many) known rivalries, I'm doubtful about it.