Top-50 Highest Athletics Department Revenues

Last Updated on March 25, 2012

This week, BusinessofCollegeSports.com has shown you the revenues, expenses and net income (profit) of athletics departments in the BCS AQ conferences.  To conclude this series, BusinessofCollegeSports.com will rank the top-5o athletics departments with the highest revenues, expenses and net income.  First up is athletics department revenues.

The data was obtained from the Department of Education and is from 2010-11.  While this data is not perfect, it is the only data publicly available for both public and private institutions.

SchoolAthletic Department RevenueConference
Texas$150,295,932.00Big 12
Ohio State$131,815,819.00Big Ten
Alabama$123,910,432.00SEC
Florida$123,008,257.00SEC
Michigan$122,486,490.00Big Ten
Penn State$116,118,026.00Big Ten
LSU$106,421,671.00SEC
Oklahoma$104,338,843.00Big 12
Auburn$103,982,441.00SEC
Tennessee$102,495,204.00SEC
Notre Dame$94,507,919.00Big East
Wisconsin$93,594,766.00Big Ten
Iowa$92,903,555.00Big Ten
Georgia$92,341,067.00SEC
Arkansas$91,768,113.00SEC
Louisville$87,736,320.00Big East
Florida State$86,946,503.00ACC
Oregon$85,740,068.00Pac-12
Kentucky$84,878,315.00SEC
South Carolina$83,704,667.00SEC
Nebraska$83,679,756.00Big Ten
Stanford$81,125,476.00Pac-12
Michigan State$80,963,182.00Big Ten
Minnesota$78,924,683.00Big Ten
Virginia$78,439,006.00ACC
USC$75,707,273.00Pac-12
Texas A&M$74,944,301.00Big 12
North Carolina$71,369,784.00ACC
Washington$70,231,336.00Pac-12
Indiana$70,172,641.00Big Ten
Oklahoma State$70,123,206.00Big 12
Kansas$70,028,683.00Big 12
Kansas State$68,875,266.00Big 12
Duke$67,986,188.00ACC
Purdue$66,066,303.00Big Ten
UCLA$66,003,893.00Pac-12
California$65,006,338.00Pac-12
Boston College$64,078,272.00ACC
Connecticut$63,043,322.00Big East
Clemson$61,174,977.00ACC
Virginia Tech$61,077,122.00ACC
Colorado$60,923,253.00Pac-12
Miami$60,325,003.00ACC
Baylor$59,859,235.00Big 12
Missouri$59,005,954.00Big 12
Arizona$58,274,431.00Pac-12
WVU$58,003,719.00Big East
Maryland$57,765,018.00ACC
Illinois$57,539,367.00Big Ten
Northwestern$56,214,293.00Big Ten

Several things stand out in this list.  First, every Big Ten team made the list.  This is notable, as the SEC is typically viewed as the “power conference” when it comes to all things finance.  The SEC had a great showing in the top-50, but only nine of its twelve athletics departments made the list.  The conference with the least athletics departments on the list was the Big East, which only placed four of its members on the list.

The chart below depicts how many places each conference held in the list.

Conference# of Athletics Departments on List% of Conference
ACC975%
Big 12880%
Big East425%
Big Ten12100%
Pac-12867%
SEC975%

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3 Comments
  • Dick
    July 25, 2013

    What you did not mention is that SEC had 9 of top 20 and those nine schools alone topped Big 10 revenue by $100 million

    • Andrew
      August 9, 2014

      Dick, your math is wrong. Did you get an SEC education?