Razorbacks Near Top of SEC in Budget Growth

Here’s a feather Arkansas fans can put in their collective cap – the Razorbacks’ athletic department budget is growing faster than that of almost all other schools in the Southeastern Conference.

Over the last three years, the university’s budget for the 17 teams in its athletics department has grown 14.4 percent to $69 million, according to a recent study conducted by SportsBusiness Journal. The publication obtained information from schools in the six major conferences.

Of the 12 SEC schools, only Auburn (18.1 percent; $95.7 million) and Kentucky (15 percent; $83.6 million) have shown a greater increase from FY2010 to FY2012.

Because it is a private university, budgets for Vanderbilt were not available.

FY2012 figures for Alabama, which dropped 1.6 percent to $94.6 million from FY2010 to FY2011, were also unavailable.

Buoyed by five of the country’s top 10 FY2012 budgets – Tennessee ($103.3 million), Florida ($97.7 million), Auburn ($95.7), LSU ($90.6 million) and Georgia ($90 million) – the report also noted the SEC has the highest median budget of the six power conferences at $90.3 million. That’s almost $22 million more than the Big 10 average.

The three-year increase in athletic budgets ranged from 8.4 percent (SEC) to 14.6 percent (ACC).