Rex Nelson: The Big Business Of College Football

Four American colleges and universities added football this season. One of them, Lyon College, is in Arkansas.

The first college football game of the 2015 season in Arkansas occurred Aug. 29 at the Batesville High School stadium when Lyon hosted Tabor College from Hillsboro, Kan. It was the first time in more than six decades for the private liberal arts school to field a team. There were just 35 players at what then was known as Arkansas College in the fall of 1949. Marcus Kaufman coached both football and basketball at the Presbyterian-affiliated institution. In the fall of 1950, there again were about 35 players who came out for football. Soon after that season ended, the school’s board of trustees decided to drop the sport, and Kaufman moved on to be an assistant football coach at Pine Bluff High School.

It was a long hiatus.

In June 2013, school officials announced that football would return. Speaking to a crowd of almost 100 people who had gathered at Edwards Common on the campus, Lyon President Donald Weatherman said the school expected at least 65 players to begin attending classes in the fall of 2014 with numbers approaching 100 players by 2015. Little Rock attorney Perry Wilson, the chairman of the Lyon board of trustees, said the addition of football would bring additional revenue, lead to an enrollment increase and excite Lyon alumni and the community.

In September 2013, Hendrix College at Conway began playing football for the first time since 1960. The Warriors defeated Westminster College from Fulton, Mo., in an afternoon game before a packed stadium in Conway that September afternoon. Hendrix was among 12 U.S. colleges and universities that launched football programs in 2013.

Lyon is the only school in the state that competes in football at the NAIA level, and Hendrix is the only Arkansas school that competes at the NCAA Division III level. Granted, it’s a long way from the Southeastern Conference brand of football that’s played at the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville. But the fact that the state of Arkansas has had two schools add intercollegiate football programs in the past three seasons is proof that college football – at all levels – has never been hotter.

STEADY INCREASE
The number of U.S. schools among all NCAA divisions, the NAIA and independents offering football stands at 773 this fall, an all-time high. The number of schools playing NCAA football (FBS, FCS, Division II and Division III) steadily increased from 484 in 1978 to 663 in 2014. There have been 32 football programs added at the NCAA, NAIA and independent levels in just the past four seasons.

David Knight, the chief legal counsel at Stephens, Inc., in Little Rock and the chairman of the Hendrix board, is quick to list the benefits of football: “Scholar-athletes are an important part of our student body. The fact we didn’t offer football was affecting us both demographically and from an admissions standpoint. There are many excellent high school students in Arkansas and across the country who fit the Hendrix academic program very well yet went other places because we didn’t offer the sport they love to play.”

At places like Hendrix and Lyon, it’s about getting more male students on campus. At traditional football powers such as Arkansas, it’s about money – big, big money.

NETWORK’S EARLY IMPACT
The SEC announced in late May that it would distribute $436.8 million out of an NCAA-record $455.8 million in revenues between its 14 institutions. Arkansas and each of the other SEC members received $31.2 million. That’s up from $20.9 million per school the previous school year. The SEC distribution is composed of revenue generated from the SEC Network, other televised football games, bowl games, the SEC football championship, televised basketball games, the SEC men’s basketball tournament and NCAA championships. Make no mistake, however, that football steers the ship in the SEC. The SEC cable television network, a joint venture with ESPN, launched just before the 2014 football season and was an immediate success.

“With less than 10 months of SEC Network money on the books and in spite of a host of one-time startup costs, the venture with ESPN is already fully distributed within the geographic footprint, nearly fully distributed nationwide and exceedingly profitable,” Andy Staples of Sports Illustrated wrote from the SEC spring meeting in Destin, Fla., in late March. “For comparison’s sake, the Big Ten Network needed five years and some serious carriage fights with major cable providers to become profitable. Both cable channels should be cash cows for their leagues’ members in the future, but the early impact of the SEC Network is nothing short of stunning. By the same token, the success of the Big Ten Network and SEC Network – combined with the new media rights deal the Big Ten will negotiate for its first- and second-tier rights next year – will create in the next few years a new class within the class system that just got created. The Power Five conferences (the ACC, Big 12, Big Ten, Pac-12 and SEC) have built a wide revenue gap between themselves and everyone else, but the Big Ten and SEC are about to build their own gap between themselves and the rest of the Power Five. They’re the Titanic Two, and everyone else is looking up at them on the balance sheet.”

The SEC Network is in 65 million homes. Increased revenue from the network will further fuel the facility arms races at Arkansas and the SEC’s 13 other schools.

NEW CENTER FOR RAZORBACKS
This year the UA is unveiling its 55,000-square-foot Jerry and Gene Jones Family Student Athlete Success Center, which cost almost $23 million. The building features 11 large tutoring rooms that will be available for groups of six to eight athletes. Twenty smaller rooms will be available for groups of two to four. There’s also 5,000 square feet of open student and lounge space in addition to large and small computer labs. Twenty-five offices house academic counselors and other staff members. There’s a dining hall with a capacity of 250 people, a full-service kitchen and a 150-seat auditorium. The building is nothing short of plush. There are wood-lined accent walls and river rock, glass and metal railings and floor-to-ceiling windows to bring in natural light.

The Jones family, owners of the Dallas Cowboys, donated $10.65 million to the project. The building was designed by WD&D of Little Rock and Heery International, Inc., of Atlanta. It was constructed by VCC of Little Rock.

The Student-Athlete Success Center complements the Fred W. Smith Football Center, which opened just before the 2013 football season. The 80,000-square-foot facility includes an NFL-quality locker room, team meeting rooms, training rooms, equipment room, lounge and study area, coaches’ offices, a reception area for recruits and displays outlining the history of Razorback football. The $40 million facility, which is adjacent to Donald W. Reynolds Razorback Stadium, is named after the chairman of the Donald W. Reynolds Foundation. Near the football center, two new practice fields and a parking deck were completed prior to the 2012 season.

ARKANSAS’ MASTER PLAN
The Student-Athlete Success Center and the Football Center are part of an athletics facilities plan expected to cost more than $300 million. The plan calls for the construction or renovation of more than a dozen athletic facilities on the UA campus. That master plan was unveiled in October 2011.

Frank Broyles, Jeff Long’s predecessor as UA athletic director, began the modern era’s push for improved facilities in the late 1990s when he traveled the state raising money for the expansion and renovation of Razorback Stadium. The $110 million project, which included a $20 million gift from the Reynolds Foundation, saw the stadium’s capacity increase from 51,000 to 72,000. The areas beneath the stands were completely enclosed with a brick-and-glass façade, concourses were widened and restrooms were replaced. The south end zone was enclosed with the addition of 7,300 seats and a food court. The improved stadium debuted in 2001.

Since then, the rush to improve facilities has spread to other schools in Arkansas.

ASU SPORTS NEW PRESS BOX, SUITES
Across the state at Jonesboro, work was completed this year on a press box and private suites at what’s now known as Centennial Bank Stadium at Arkansas State University. ASU held a news conference in August 2014 to announce a $5 million gift from alumnus Johnny Allison of Conway. Construction on the stadium began before the end of the 2014 season. The press box was expanded from 7,120 to 38,000 square feet. It features 20 suites, 42 loge boxes and 344 club seats. Improvements also were made to concourse restrooms, concession areas and ticket booths.

ASU’s stadium was built in 1974. It has grown through the years from its original capacity of 16,343 to more than 30,000 seats. When ASU moved up from what’s now the FCS to what’s now the FBS in 1991, a deck was added to one side of the stadium. In 2001, a new scoreboard and video board were installed at a cost of more than $1 million. An end zone facility for coaches and players was built in 2002. In 2012, the school announced plans to build a $22 million football operations center. Money is still being raised for that facility.

UCA’S DISTINCTIVE FIELD
In Conway, meanwhile, the University of Central Arkansas (which plays at the FCS level in the Southland Conference) added luxury suites to Estes Stadium in 2012 while also adding a strength and conditioning complex to the school’s indoor practice facility. The thing that received the most attention, however, was UCA’s decision to replace its natural grass field prior to the 2011 season with an artificial surface that featured the school’s colors of purple and gray rather than the traditional green.

“The decision to install synthetic turf was one that came quickly,” Brad Teague, the UCA athletic director, said at the time. “We decided to use that opportunity to do something unique. We didn’t want to copy Boise State (which has blue turf) or Eastern Washington (which has red turf), so we developed our own color scheme.”

The luxury suites are the top floor of a dormitory that was built adjacent to the stadium.

Following a multi-million dollar appropriation by the Arkansas Legislature, the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff built the 16,000-seat Golden Lion Stadium at a cost of $14 million in 2000. The school later added the $5 million J. Thomas May Athletic Field House and a football practice field, giving it perhaps the best football facilities in the Southwestern Athletic Conference.

IMPROVEMENTS ACROSS THE STATE
Even the six schools in Arkansas that compete at the NCAA Division II level – Arkansas Tech University, Harding University, Henderson State University, Ouachita Baptist University, Southern Arkansas University and the University of Arkansas at Monticello – have been busy making facility improvements since the turn of the century.

Harding, for example, transformed its Alumni Field into First Security Stadium. During the 2011 season, the school opened the Jim Citty Football and Athletic Training Complex at one end of the stadium with a spacious locker room, weight room, training facility, classrooms and meeting rooms.

In Russellville, a $6.7 million addition at one end of Buerkle Field in 2001 included offices, reception areas, a lounge, meeting rooms, a weight room, a film editing room, a dressing room and a training area. A dormitory was built adjacent to the stadium in 2007 and included a new press box and private suites for Arkansas Tech football games. Restroom and concession facilities were upgraded, and a larger scoreboard was unveiled.

In Arkadelphia, Ouachita began tearing down the home side of A.U. Williams Field soon after the end of the 2013 season and unveiled the multimillion-dollar Cliff Harris Stadium to start the 2014 campaign. The Tigers responded by going undefeated in the regular season and winning their second Great American Conference championship in four years.

On the other side of U.S. Highway 67 in Arkadelphia, Henderson (which won GAC conference championships in 2012-13) is improving parking and adding a new main entrance to Carpenter-Haygood Stadium. The school completed its 19,235-square-foot Formby Athletic Center adjacent to the stadium in 2003 and installed an artificial surface at the stadium in 2011. This year, an artificial surface and lights are being added to the football practice field.

In Monticello, UAM dedicated an indoor practice facility, offices and meeting rooms at one end of Convoy Leslie Cotton Boll Stadium prior to the 2009 season. In Magnolia, Southern Arkansas added artificial turf to Wilkins Stadium just prior to the 2006 season.

AB’S JUNIOR COLLEGE GAME
At Arkansas Baptist College in Little Rock, President Fitzgerald Hill (a former assistant head football coach at the University of Arkansas) created the state’s only junior college football program in 2007. Years earlier, when Hill was the assistant head coach and recruiting coordinator under Houston Nutt in Fayetteville, Charles Ripley of Little Rock had worked unsuccessfully with Hill to establish a junior college football program at Pulaski Tech.

“We’re filling a void,” Ripley said on the eve of that first season at Arkansas Baptist in 2007. “Serving the underserved is our motto. Our foundation is taking care of our own. We don’t need other states taking care of our kids.”

Former Ole Miss and New Orleans Saints quarterback Archie Manning now chairs the National Football Foundation and College Hall of Fame. He applauds the expansion of college football at places such as Hendrix and Lyon.

“With more than 1 million high school students playing football and more than 70,000 spots on college teams, there’s plenty of room for expansion,” Manning says. “These colleges clearly recognize that football can play an important role in encouraging students to continue their educations by enticing them to enroll.”

And at places like the UA, it can also mean millions of dollars in revenue. College football, a sport that began in 1869, has never been a bigger business. And there’s no end to the growth in sight.

(Illustration by Shafali Anand)