The NCAA" Women Problem...

[wire chief]

...is the title of a NY Times editorial today that decries the lack of any money for women's victories, compared to those of the men. The article starts with the perceived meaningless-to-the-NCAA dynasty UConn has created.
And ends with "Go UConn".
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/26/opinion/the-ncaas-women-problem.html?_r=0

 

[Sonny44]

Wow, something has to be done about this. Totally unfair!

 

[chrissaran]

Great article. Sheds light on the very dark side of college athletics.

 

[bags27]

Of course, hard to disagree with that. But money drives everything: how much do WNBA players make compared with NBA players? MCBB March Madness is huge business. I think this year there is ~$9B bet on the men's brackets. How much on women's? Advertising for MCBB I'm sure is vastly greater. How much does a final four ticket cost for MCBB vs. WCBB? Simply put, the revenue issue drives the pay-off issue.

 

[JordyG]

Excuse me while I soapbox just a bit. As I've gone through my fairly substantial years I've come to the realization that women on the whole are just better human beings than we men. Smarter, more giving, more understanding more forgiving, more civilized. Yeah, like any finite being they have their faults. But theirs just seem less egregious. And yet worldwide women are treated, not merely as second class citizens, but second rate humans. Indian Falls, this, and the myriad slights and oppressions women endure daily in this world is horrifying. A societies greatness to me is evident by how we treat each other. I love being a man, but I am all too frequently ashamed by the things we do.

 

[intlzncster]

Excuse me while I soapbox just a bit. As I've gone through my fairly substantial years I've come to the realization that women on the whole are just better human beings than we men. Smarter, more giving, more understanding more forgiving, more civilized. Yeah, like any finite being they have their faults. But theirs just seem less egregious. And yet worldwide women are treated, not merely as second class citizens, but second rate humans. Indian Falls, this, and the myriad slights and oppressions women endure daily in this world is horrifying. A societies greatness to me is evident by how we treat each other. I love being a man, but I am all too frequently ashamed by the things we do.

Holy crap that was the most nonsensical, myopic thing I've read on here in a while. Classic case of observation bias. From someone who works with both female and male youth to young adults.

 

[intlzncster]

Wow, something has to be done about this. Totally unfair!

What? It's totally fair. In sports, you get paid according to what you bring in. The more revenue you generate, the more money you'll receive as a group. The WNBA and the women's tournament don't get the advertising dollars, TV contracts, or ticket sales anywhere near the men, not because they are women, but because the vast majority of sports fans aren't interested in the sport.

How many women's D1 programs are even profitable? Not more than a handful I'm guessing. It used to be just UCONN and TN, but I haven't checked in years. Women's basketball is a money loser as a whole for Universities nationally. So is the WNBA.

It's not because women are 'less than' men; it's because that is what the market demands. What you seem to want is women to be treated differently (preferentially) to men. You get paid what you are worth, and that's the fairest system there can be.

 

[JordyG]

Holy crap that was the most nonsensical thing I've read on herein a while. Classic case of observation bias. From someone who works with both female and male youth to young adults.

Well, maybe nonsensical experience bias. Maybe pseudo-feminist, pandering hogwash. Maybe empirical cultural totemism. But not merely observational. No, not at all. This is all life experience. From someone who has worked with male and female adults, prepubescents, young adults, and the mentally and physically challenged for 25 years.

 

[JordyG]

What? It's totally fair. In sports, you get paid according to what you bring in. The more revenue you generate, the more money you'll receive as a group. The WNBA and the women's tournament don't get the advertising dollars, TV contracts, or ticket sales anywhere near the men, not because they are women, but because the vast majority of sports fans aren't interested in the sport.

How many women's D1 programs are even profitable? Not more than a handful I'm guessing. It used to be just UCONN and TN, but I haven't checked in years. Women's basketball is a money loser as a whole for Universities nationally. So is the WNBA.

It's not because women are 'less than' men; it's because that is what the market demands. What you seem to want is women to be treated differently (preferentially) to men. You get paid what you are worth, and that's the fairest system there can be.

No one is saying in D1 that women's teams in the NCAA's should get the same as men. What has been decried is although they do bring in money from the Dance they get NOTHING. To most that should sound patently unfair.

 

[Fairfield Fan]

...is the title of a NY Times editorial today that decries the lack of any money for women's victories, compared to those of the men. The article starts with the perceived meaningless-to-the-NCAA dynasty UConn has created.
And ends with "Go UConn".
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/26/opinion/the-ncaas-women-problem.html?_r=0

Glad you posted this. Just saw it. What a scandal!! How grossly unfair. And when Connecticut is struggling to pay for intercollegiate athletics, and registering a $20 million deficit overall, how terribly unfair to the university and to our great basketball team to get stiffed by the sexist NCAA!!!!

It's a scandal!

 

[intlzncster]

No one is saying in D1 that women's teams in the NCAA's should get the same as men. What has been decried is although they do bring in money from the Dance they get NOTHING. To most that should sound patently unfair.

The writer of the article didn't even cite any figures. He just makes assumptions

Where are the revenue figures, by conference, tournament, school, etc? What are all the TV contract details? Sell outs are great, but how much are the tickets across the tournament? I'm willing to bet, although I don't know, that the revenue figure is pretty damn low, if positive at all at a national and or conference level.

The guy seems to think revenue should be shared just...because.

 

[KnightBridgeAZ]

The writer of the article didn't even cite any figures. He just makes assumptions

View attachment 12787


Where are the revenue figures, by conference, tournament, school, etc? What are all the TV contract details? Sell outs are great, but how much are the tickets across the tournament? I'm willing to bet, although I don't know, that the revenue figure is pretty damn low, if positive at all at a national and or conference level.

The guy seems to think revenue should be shared just...because.

I never heard that the women's tournament was a great moneymaker. Now, maybe I just missed the news (and yes, I think it is a shame), but . . .

Incidentally, while I didn't look at the attendance figures, the announcers said that Rupp would not be sold out last night for the home team Sweet 16. Tell me again about the "no home team" men's tournament attendance?

 

[intlzncster]

Incidentally, while I didn't look at the attendance figures, the announcers said that Rupp would not be sold out last night for the home team Sweet 16. Tell me again about the "no home team" men's tournament attendance?

Dunno where you can find a good summary by team and location. I'm not willing to do all the leg work on that one. This is the best I could do. Third page down at the bottom of the page gives men's 2014 NCAA tournament average attendance by site, but that's it.

http://fs.ncaa.org/Docs/stats/m_basketball_RB/Reports/attend/2014.pdf

 

[j66kicker]

No one is saying in D1 that women's teams in the NCAA's should get the same as men. What has been decried is although they do bring in money from the Dance they get NOTHING. To most that should sound patently unfair.

Sadly, the women's NCAA tournament is a money-loser itself. OTOH the men's tourney, over and above attendance-related revenue, has an $10.8 Billion TV contract with CBS and TBS over 14 years (2011-24). That's $771 million/year just for TV, just for the 3-week tournament.

 

[ctfjr]

...is the title of a NY Times editorial today that decries the lack of any money for women's victories, compared to those of the men. The article starts with the perceived meaningless-to-the-NCAA dynasty UConn has created.
And ends with "Go UConn".
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/26/opinion/the-ncaas-women-problem.html?_r=0

Thanks for posting. Must reading. I have forwarded that link to several of my wbb fan friends.

 

[Fairfield Fan]

The writer of the article didn't even cite any figures. He just makes assumptions

View attachment 12787


Where are the revenue figures, by conference, tournament, school, etc? What are all the TV contract details? Sell outs are great, but how much are the tickets across the tournament? I'm willing to bet, although I don't know, that the revenue figure is pretty damn low, if positive at all at a national and or conference level.

The guy seems to think revenue should be shared just...because.

I find it difficult to believe that the women's tournament loses money. ESPN is broadcasting hours and hours of this tournament, and not just on ESPN2, but on the main ESPN channel as well. Travel costs aren't much, and can usually be easily handled by admission to the venues.

I would very much like to see a follow-up by the media on exactly how much revenue this tournament really brings in. But to give nothing to participating schools, even when this is nationally televised, just smells. Something's wrong with this picture.

 

[HoopsFan21]

I find it difficult to believe that the women's tournament loses money. ESPN is broadcasting hours and hours of this tournament, and not just on ESPN2, but on the main ESPN channel as well. Travel costs aren't much, and can usually be easily handled by admission to the venues.

I would very much like to see a follow-up by the media on exactly how much revenue this tournament really brings in. But to give nothing to participating schools, even when this is nationally televised, just smells. Something's wrong with this picture.

UConn WCBB lost $2.6 million last year, and that's the best team in the game, so I'm not surprised that the tournament loses money. People just don't want to watch an "inferior" brand of basketball, and that's the perception problem the women's game has, and may always have.

 

[vtcwbuff]

And if you watched today's game you saw an inferior brand of basketball. Take UConn and maybe a couple of other teams out of the picture and you have a game that's often difficult to watch.

 

[j66kicker]

I find it difficult to believe that the women's tournament loses money. ESPN is broadcasting hours and hours of this tournament, and not just on ESPN2, but on the main ESPN channel as well. Travel costs aren't much, and can usually be easily handled by admission to the venues.

I would very much like to see a follow-up by the media on exactly how much revenue this tournament really brings in. But to give nothing to participating schools, even when this is nationally televised, just smells. Something's wrong with this picture.

The ESPN contract which includes the WBB tourney also includes international rights to broadcast the men's tourney, and broadcast rights for the College World Series plus 21 other minor sport championships including women's gymnastics, men's and women's fencing, Division I women's lacrosse, Division I men's and women's outdoor track, women's bowling, etc. It's a long-term contract (>10 yrs) with 600 hours of programming per year. I couldn't find where the $$ is public, but I can't imagine it amounts to enough to cover costs of these championships).

I believe the NCAA pays for the losses in the women's tournament (and other championships?) from the men's tourney windfall. The men's tourney TV revenue is over 80% of the NCAA's total revenue (football TV and other football revenues go directly to the schools).

BTW I learned that TV revenue is the second leading source of revenue for D1 football programs. #1 is booster donations. From a sample of 20 mostly D1 WBB programs: UCONN's booster donations were $389k. TN, TA&M, Wisconsin and Oklahoma were all over $1m (Baylor's was suspected to be high, but is a private school and doesn't make this info available). Most of this booster money (for WBB) is season ticket "seat rights" donations. In contrast, football booster donations for SEC schools run around $20m per year.

 

[wire chief]

Two or 3 seasons ago I attended the So Fla game. I was near shocked to find out that entrance wasn't 2 bucks like it usually was, but $33, cause UConn was in town. And the fans were fully in.
You mean to tell me UConn qualified for no money that could come from the NCAA?

 

[intlzncster]

Two or 3 seasons ago I attended the So Fla game. I was near shocked to find out that entrance wasn't 2 bucks like it usually was, but $33, cause UConn was in town. And the fans were fully in.
You mean to tell me UConn qualified for no money that could come from the NCAA?

Only problem is that the money has to be distributed equally tournament wide. If every team was UCONN, then yes, there'd be money to spread around.

 

[UcMiami]

By making the women's rights part of the total 'other' NCAA broadcasting rights they can clearly hide the revenue of the Women's tourney amongst all the much less followed sports. BUT - the NCAA is an organization for the promotion of scholastic sports that is made up of all NCAA D1, D2, and D3 schools - the schools themselves are under title IX and must allocate equal facilities access and money across genders in sports with no regard for where that money is generated. So the NCAA participation payments to schools are not for the 'men's basketball team' they are for the school's general fund that has to be split in compliance with title IX (just as the football revenue is.)
There is no direct correlation between the teams playing in the tournament and the revenue they receive so there is no reason that the member schools could not decide to pay appearance fees for every sport, or to split the revenue amongst all schools who compete in D1 basketball or whatever they wanted. The NCAA could just as easily have packaged the Men's and Women's tournament as a single broadcast right or the men's broadcast rights with all other NCAA tournaments and sold the women's rights separately and you would have the same obfuscation of actual revenues associated with each sport.
The point the article is making is valid - title IX compliance is somewhat obscured. It is hard to believe that the broadcast rights (and revenue generated by all the ads) and the hours of original programming in primetime for the women's tournament is not generating significantly more revenue for the NCAA than they expend on the tournament. The decision the member schools have come up with to not reward wonen's tournament participation is questionable at best - in effect they are deciding to use whatever revenue the women's tournament generates solely to support the other 'lesser' sports but to reward men's tournament participation with some of the men's tournament revenue. The men's NCAA track and field is being partly subsidized by women's basketball because I am sure part of the rights negotiation for the second jewel that the NCAA owns (the women's tournament) probably includes a requirement that x hours of track and field be broadcast nationally.

 

[DaddyChoc]

lets be happy that they womens games are televised and your WatchESPN app is somewhat working for a replay of the womens games