A look at some cost-cutting measures by college athletic departments

Colleges trimming athletics costs

Some of the cost-cutting measures undertaken by college athletic departments and conferences:

ON THE BUS

Miami will bus its football team to games at South Florida in Tampa and Central Florida in Orlando instead of flying, saving $140,000. Tulane says it will fly only to games if the opponent is at least 400 miles away. Virginia Tech will bus its teams to Maryland, saving $80,000. Central Florida will save $50,000 by busing teams to Florida State.

MEDIA GUIDES

Michigan, Ohio State, Wisconsin, Oregon, Texas A&M (except football), Iowa State, Rice, South Florida, Arkansas State, Ohio Valley Conference and the Mid-American Conference are all eliminating printed media guides. The Pac-10 has proposed NCAA legislation that would ban printed media in all sports.

MEET AND GREETS

The Big Sky Conference, Ohio Valley Conference, Southern Conference and Sun Belt Conference are all dropping in-person media days, opting for teleconferences in some cases. The Mid-American Conference and Western Athletic Conference are eliminating them for basketball only.

TRAVEL SQUADS

The Atlantic Coast Conference voted to cap football travel squads for league games at 72 players. There was no limit previously. The Pac-10 cut the size of its travel squad to 25 in baseball (from 26), 13 in basketball (15), nine in men and women’s cross country (10), 15 in gymnastics (17), 20 in women’s soccer (22), 19 in softball (20), 14 in volleyball (15) and 13 in wrestling (15). Conference USA reduced the size of its travel squads from 70 to 66 in football, from 22 to 20 in women’s soccer and from 20 to 18 in men’s soccer.

JOB CUTS

Tennessee plans to save about $500,000 by leaving five administrative positions unfilled, including two associate athletic director positions, the director of event management, an assistant sports information director and having the women’s track and field coach also coach the men’s team. Stanford has laid off 24 employees, saving about $1 million.

SPORTS CUTS (savings included when known)

Washington, men’s and women’s swimming ($1.2 million); Massachusetts, men’s and women’s skiing ($100,000); Pepperdine, men’s track and field; Southeastern Louisiana, men’s tennis; Indiana State, men’s and women’s tennis; Maine, women’s volleyball, men’s soccer; Northern Iowa, baseball; Vermont baseball and softball; Nicholls State, women’s golf; Massachusetts Institute of Technology, men’s and women’s hockey, men’s and women’s gymnastics, skiing, golf, pistol shooting and wrestling; Kutztown, men’s soccer and men’s swimming.

CONFERENCE TOURNAMENTS

—The Western Athletic Conference is cutting the size of its tournament field to six teams in women’s volleyball, men’s tennis, women’s tennis, softball, baseball and soccer. As many as nine teams qualified in previous years. It also is eliminating the play-in game for it men’s and women’s basketball tournaments.

—Conference USA is cutting the size of the tournament fields in baseball from eight to six, from 12 to 8 in volleyball, from eight to six in women’s soccer and it eliminated the play-in game in softball.

Source: Associated Press research.