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The money behind the Madness: Wide disparities in funding for NCAA athletic departments

25 March 2021
Dan Ackermann
Data: Department of Education; Chart: Danielle Alberti/Axios

The beauty of March Madness is in the diversity of its participants, evidenced by the remaining schools' total athletic department expenses.

By the numbers: The Sweet 16 runs the gamut from behemoths like FSU ($198.4 million in fiscal year 2019) to this year's Cinderella, Oral Roberts ($12.1 million).

  • There's an even split of schools that spend over and under $100 million on athletics.
  • Four teams spend at least 25% of their athletics budget on men's basketball: Gonzaga (35%), Creighton (32%), Villanova (28%) and Loyola Chicago (25%).

Wild stat: Five schools (FSU, UCLA, Alabama, Villanova and Syracuse) spend more on men's hoops than Oral Roberts spends on its entire athletic department.