#AddMoreAthletes

Higher education has a steep economic hill to climb. The enrollment cliff is real. Grants are shrinking. The very relevance of a degree is under fire. And now athletics departments are staring down revenue sharing.

I love the initiative led by Brent Richard and Drew Weatherford , it’s the kind of bold thinking higher ed needs right now.

The question isn’t if the economic threat is coming — it’s how to fund higher education - and in particular, how to fund college athletics sustainably. Cut sports? Raise student fees? Chase “efficiencies”? Private capital? Everything is on the table.

Here’s the bigger question that I keep thinking through: what’s the role of higher education in our society?

In a world where AI will commoditize career paths, what actually differentiates people in the workforce? As my dear friend Brendan Kavanagh says: AI is not EI.

And short of the military, in my experience, nothing builds emotional intelligence like college athletics — teamwork, resilience, grit, leadership. These are the lessons that separate graduates in a job market flooded with sameness.

But the economics are brutal. Most athletics departments already operate at a loss. Revenue sharing only widens the gap. 

Which begs the mission question: what role should athletics play on campus? 

We’re already seeing diverging paths:

• Sonoma State University recently eliminated its entire athletics department amid a $24M budget deficit. While it may solve immediate financial challenges, it risks eroding student engagement, community ties, and long-term relevance.
• University of the Pacific , by contrast, added new sports programs — bringing in more than 80 athletes during a time when many institutions are cutting back. Their goal: grow enrollment and tuition revenue without major scholarship costs, turning athletics into a driver of growth, not a drain.

The Ivy League proves the long-term model works. Despite offering zero athletic scholarships, Ivy schools nearly double the national average in varsity sports, ~18 per NCAA Division I school.

Harvard University , Princeton University , Cornell University , Brown University , Columbia University , Dartmouth College , University of Pennsylvania , and Yale University each field 30–42 sports - including sports like sprint football, equestrian, and lightweight rowing. Together, they’ve built some of the strongest alumni networks in the world on the back of broad-based athletics.

While some sports at the D1 level have become transactional in nature, the concept of adding sports creates something different — pride, identity, and culture that bind students and alumni. I lived this at Lehigh University . Playing basketball was special. But being an alum — and part of that lifelong community — has been priceless to me.

And adding sports isn’t just bold. It’s practical:

• Drive enrollment and fundraising (adding men’s volleyball has grown rosters by 20–30 at many schools).
• Maximize facility use across seasons and weekends.
• Introduce student leadership careers in coaching, operations, marketing, and media.
• Connect communities through new teams and streaming platforms.

The data backs it up: The NFHS Network streams over 1M high school games annually. Organizations like FloSports and PrestoSports have proven that every sport can find an audience when delivered right.

So the legacy question is simple: will universities be remembered for cutting their way to survival — or growing their way to relevance?

Let’s start using athletics for what it is - a growth engine. The future of higher ed depends on it.

#HigherEd #CollegeSports #Leadership #addmoreathletes