NCAA Universities Eliminating Programs Similarities

Over the last month, Akron eliminated three programs, Bowling Green State eliminated baseball, Central Michigan eliminated men's track (analysis coming soon), Cincinnati eliminates men's soccer, East Carolina eliminates both men's and women's swimming & diving and men's and women's tennis (analysis coming soon), Florida International University eliminates men's indoor track and Old Dominion eliminates wrestling.

In most cases, the university has stated they will honor existing athletic scholarships (probably out of goodwill to the students but also probably as a means to try to retain most of those students for the upcoming academic year - and the tuition revenue that is generated as well).

One similarity between these programs is the size of the sum of Direct State Support, Student Fees and Direct Institutional Support.  Here are the most recent financial numbers for the athletic department as a whole.

University	FY	State Support	Student Fees	Direct Institutional Support	Total
Akron	2019	$0	$0	$26,011,378	$26,011,378
Bowling Green	2019	$0	$12,935,182	$2,690,000	$15,625,182
Central Michigan	2019	$0	$0	$25,210,154	$25,210,154
Cincinnati	2019	$0	$0	$27,261,434	$27,261,434
East Carolina	2019	$1,218,612	$15,277,318	$11,949,246	$28,445,176
Florida International	2019	$53,412	$22,366,985	$5,317,342	$27,737,739
Old Dominion	2019	$0	$28,784,075	$0	$28,784,075

As you can see these athletic departments receive over $25.5 million in State/Student/Institutional subsidies.  If these subsidies are going away, then this might be a reason for athletic programs to be eliminated.

Florida International University Eliminates Mens Indoor Track

Earlier this month, it was reported that Florida International University eliminated the men's indoor track athletic program.  I have recently looked at Old Dominion (wrestling), Bowling Green State (baseball), Cincinnati (men's soccer), and Akron (men's cross country, men's golf and women's tennis).  Now I provide a brief look at the Panthers elimination of men's indoor track.

Note:  I am not including tuition revenue of the student-athletes as revenue to the athletic department, as I contend that tuition revenue is revenue generated by the academic units, not the athletic unit.  As you may guess, economists are not unified on this.  Go figure!!

Likewise I am not adjusting for internal transfers from the university in the form of subsidies for the athletic department as well.  For Florida International University, over 60% of the total operating revenue for the athletic department comes from student fees.  Additionally for the last three fiscal years, Direct Institutional Support accounts for on average 10% of the athletic departments total operating revenues.

My takeaway:  Eliminating this program reduces the athletic department's deficit, but don't get the Panthers to the Title IX "prong 1" test.  My guess is the university is reducing its direct institutional support for the athletic program and as such these three programs were eliminated.

One additional note.  Men's Indoor Track is combined with Men's Outdoor Track and Men's Cross Country, thus the numbers below reflect the combination of those three programs.  Additionally, for those that would adjust for tuition revenue, it is not appropriate in this case, the members of the Men's Indoor Track program are the same as the members for the Men's Outdoor Track program, so there is no tuition revenue lost.  (Actually 62 of the 63 participants in Men's Indoor Track program over the last three years were also members of the Men's Outdoor Track program).

Before I get to the individual numbers, one thing I want to point out is that for Florida International University, the majority of Athletic Department Total Operating Revenues comes from Student Fees and Direct Institutional Support.  Here are the numbers for fiscal years (FY) 2016/17, 2017/18 and 2018/19.

FY	Direct State	Student Fees	Direct Institutional Support	Total Op. Revenue
2017	$68,858	$21,096,485	$2,451,524	$33,389,929
2018	$67,425	$21,584,797	$3,198,940	$34,893,144
2019	$53,412	$22,366,985	$5,317,342	$37,018,133

Turning now to the reported finances for the Men's Indoor Track Progam, we see the program generating very little operating revenue.  Note for 2017, 63% of the total operating revenue for both men's track and men's cross country programs was from student fees and over 90% of the total operating revenue for both men's track and men's cross country programs was from Direct Institutional Support.

FIU	FY	Total Op.	Total Op.	Surplus/	Scholarship	Surplus/Deficit
		Revenue	Expenses	Deficit	Expenses	w/o StudentAid
M-IndoorTrack	2017	$352,285	$399,248	-$46,963	$123,825	$76,862
M-IndoorTrack	2018	$4,523	$357,584	-$353,061	$80,565	-$272,496
M-IndoorTrack	2019	$17,865	$251,451	-$233,586	$73,730	-$159,856

In fiscal year 2017 (ignoring tuition revenue and university transfers to the men's indoor/outdoor and men's cross country program), the combined three programs had a surplus.  This is primarily due to the $117K of NCAA funds distributed to the men's indoor/outdoor and men's cross country program.

Using the EADA data, I looked up for each fiscal year the following:
Full-time Equivalent Male Counts and Female Counts; and Male student aid and Female Student Aid.

I calculate the following (in terms of percentages):

Name	FY	Male%	Female%	Male-Aid%	Female-Aid%	Difference
FIU	2017	43.64%	56.36%	50.89%	49.11%	7.25%
FIU	2018	43.51%	56.49%	53.80%	46.20%	10.29%
FIU	2019	43.10%	56.90%	58.45%	41.55%	15.35%

As you can see, FIU provides (in percentage terms) between 7% to 15% more student athletic aid to male student-athletes than is representative of the male full time equivalent of the student population.

Akron eliminates three athletic programs

Last week the University of Akron eliminated men's cross country, men's golf and women's tennis.  Recently, I have looked at the financial impact of eliminating athletic programs at Old Dominion, Bowling Green and Cincinnati.  Now I turn to Akron.

Note:  I am not including tuition revenue of the student-athletes as revenue to these three programs, as I contend that tuition revenue is revenue generated by the academic units, not the athletic unit.  As you may guess, economists are not unified on this.  Go figure!!

My takeaway:  Eliminating these three programs reduce the athletic department's deficit, but don't get the Zips to the Title IX prong 1 test.  My guess is the university is reducing its direct institutional support for the athletic program and as such these three programs were eliminated.

Before I get to the individual numbers, one thing I want to point out is that for Akron, the majority of Athletic Department Total Operating Revenues comes from Direct Institutional Support.  Here are the numbers for fiscal years (FY) 2016/17, 2017/18 and 2018/19.

Akron	FY	Direct Institutional Support	Total Op. Revenue	Percentage
	2017	$24,641,163	$31,571,461	78.05%
	2018	$24,289,339	$30,412,150	79.87%
	2019	$26,011,378	$37,194,485	69.93%

Now turning to the three athletic programs, we notice all three generate very little operating revenues.

Akron	FY	Total Op.	Total Op.	Surplus/	Scholarship	Surplus/Deficit
		Revenue	Expenses	Deficit	Expenses	w/o StudentAid
W-Tennis	2017	$21,438	$493,208	-$471,770	$287,894	-$183,876
W-Tennis	2018	$26,989	$490,963	-$463,974	$270,897	-$193,077
W-Tennis	2019	$52,425	$564,439	-$512,014	$287,768	-$224,246
M-Golf	2017	$80,423	$391,789	-$311,366	$139,691	-$171,675
M-Golf	2018	$140,705	$453,628	-$312,923	$136,627	-$176,296
M-Golf	2019	$78,674	$400,061	-$321,387	$143,572	-$177,815
M-CrossCountry	2017	$44,328	$322,908	-$278,579	$116,623	-$161,956
M-CrossCountry	2018	$37,251	$296,164	-$258,912	$112,597	-$146,316
M-CrossCountry	2019	$29,952	$309,625	-$279,673	$111,741	-$167,932

Using the EADA data, I looked up for each fiscal year the following:
Full-time Equivalent Male Counts and Female Counts; and Male student aid and Female Student Aid.

I calculate the following (in terms of percentages):

Name	FY	Male%	Female%	Male-Aid%	Female-Aid%	Difference
Akron	2017	55.08%	44.92%	56.94%	43.06%	1.85%
Akron	2018	54.42%	45.58%	58.47%	41.53%	4.05%
Akron	2019	54.28%	45.72%	58.49%	41.51%	4.20%

Men's athletic student aid was about 58.5% of total athletic student aid for the 2018/19 fiscal year, with men's full time equivalent enrollment about 52.3% of the full time student body enrollment.  Eliminating the scholarship aid for Men's Golf and Men's Cross Country is almost the same as scholarship aid to the Women's Tennis program results in not much gain in the Title IX "prong 1" test for compliance.

Additionally, reducing Men's Cross Country is not eliminating student tuition, since 14 of the 15 Men's cross country participants also participate in Men's Track and Field.

Cincinnati Eliminates Mens Soccer

Last month, ESPN reported that the University of Cincinnati announced that it was eliminating the men's soccer athletic program.  Recently, I analyzed Old Dominion's decision to eliminate wrestling and Bowling Green State's decision to eliminate baseball.  In each case I concluded that it would reduce athletic department deficits and help the university with Title IX compliance.

Note:  I am not including tuition revenue of the student-athletes as revenue to the men's soccer program as I contend that tuition revenue is revenue generated by the academic units, not the athletic unit.  As you may guess, economists are not unified on this.  Go figure!!

My takeaway:  dropping men's soccer 1.) reduces the athletic department's fiscal year deficit, but 2.) does not meet the Title IX "prong 1" test, though it helps a little.

Here are the athletic department financial numbers for the men's soccer program for the 2016/17 to 2018/19 fiscal years.  (Athletic Department financial numbers were acquired via public records requests).

First before I present the financial results, I want to note that the majority of the men's soccer program total operating revenues come from a line called Direct Institutional Support (i.e. a subsidy or transfer from the university to the men's soccer program).  These direct subsidies represent 86.53% in 2016/17 fiscal year; 91.4% in 2017/18; and 95.26% in fiscal year 2018/19 of the men's soccer total operating revenues.  Thus I am going to present the financial results with the Direct Institutional Support first, and then without the Direct Institutional Support for comparison purposes.

First, here are the financial figures for the men's soccer program including Direct Institutional Support (DIS):

Cincinnati	FY	Total Op.	Total Op.	Surplus/	Participants
		Revenue	Expenses	Deficit
M-Soccer	2017	$154,203	$853,324	-$699,121	26
M-Soccer	2018	$137,106	$839,967	-$702,861	25
M-Soccer	2019	$181,247	$907,745	-$726,498	29

As you can see, men's soccer generates about a $700K accounting deficit just using the total operating revenue and total operating expenses that the athletic department supplies to the NCAA.

Yet, as I have mentioned before, scholarship expenses are not really an economic cost to the athletic department, and as such, I present the impact of excluding scholarship expenses from total operating expenses.

Cincinnati	FY	Surplus/	Scholarship	Surplus/Deficit
		Deficit	Expenses	w/o Student Aid
M-Soccer	2017	-$699,121	$383,811	-$315,310
M-Soccer	2018	-$702,861	$383,342	-$319,519
M-Soccer	2019	-$726,498	$404,289	-$322,209

The last column reports that excluding the scholarship expenses, the men's soccer program still results in about $320K deficit.  Yet, as I mentioned above over 85% of the total operating revenues comes from direct institutional support of the men's soccer program.  This is an internal transfer from one unit of the university to the athletic department's men's soccer program.  If we exclude Direct Institutional Support (as it is also not revenue that is generated by the athletic program), how does that change the financial impact that men's soccer has on the athletic department's finances?

Cincinnati	FY	Total Op.	DIS	Total Op.	Total Op.	Surplus/Deficit	Scholarship	Surplus/Deficit
		Revenue		Revenue	Expenses	w/o DIS	Expenses	w/o StudentAid
				w/0 DIS				w/o DIS
M-Soccer	2017	$154,203	$133,425	$20,778	$853,324	-$832,546	$383,811	-$448,735
M-Soccer	2018	$137,106	$125,311	$11,795	$839,967	-$828,172	$383,342	-$444,830
M-Soccer	2019	$181,247	$172,654	$8,593	$907,745	-$899,152	$404,289	-$494,863

Thus, excluding Direct Institutional Support as operating revenues and scholarship expenses as operating expenses, we see that over the last three fiscal years, the men's soccer program has resulted in a deficit of between $450K to $500K.

Therefore, eliminating the men's soccer program is reducing the financial impact on the athletic department.

Now turning to the issue of Title IX, here is how the athletic department has fared over the last three fiscal years.  Using the EADA data, I looked up for each fiscal year the following:
Full-time Equivalent Male Counts and Female Counts; and Male student aid and Female Student Aid.

I calculate the following (in terms of percentages):

Name	FY	Male%	Female%	Male-Aid%	Female-Aid%	Difference
Cincinnati	2017	52.78%	47.22%	60.35%	39.65%	7.58%
Cincinnati	2018	52.89%	47.11%	57.48%	42.52%	4.59%
Cincinnati	2019	52.77%	47.23%	60.14%	39.86%	7.37%

Thus male student athlete aid is between 4.6% to 7.6% higher than the proportion of full time equivalent males in the student body.  This is higher than the accepted difference from just "prong 1" of the Title IX test, but Cincinnati may be in compliance given they are reducing the men's soccer program as moving towards a proportional rate as compared to the student body male-female percentages.

Bowling Green State Eliminates Baseball

Two days ago, Bowling Green State announced that it was eliminating baseball effective immediately.  Recently, I analyzed Old Dominion's decision to eliminate wrestling and I concluded that it would reduce athletic department deficits and help the university with Title IX compliance.

Given this decision by BGSU, I thought I would do the same for the baseball program as I did for the ODU wrestling program.

Note:  I am not including tuition revenue of the student-athletes as revenue to the baseball program as I contend that tuition revenue is revenue generated by the academic units, not the athletic unit.  As you may guess, economists are not unified on this.  Go figure!!
Then again, I am not adjusting for student fees that account for nearly 50% of BGSU's athletic department total operating revenues, nor am I adjusting for the 5% to 13% Direct Institutional Support (both can be thought of as subsidies for the athletic department) that contributed to the athletic department's total operating revenues.

My takeaway:  dropping baseball 1.) reduces the athletic department's fiscal year deficit, but 2.) does not meet the Title IX "prong 1" test, though it helps a little.

Here are the athletic department financial numbers for the baseball program for the 2016/17 to 2018/19 fiscal years.  (Athletic Department financial numbers were acquired via public records requests).

Bowling Green	FY	Total Op.	Total Op.	Surplus/	Scholarship	Surplus/Deficit
State University		Revenue	Expenses	Deficit	Expenses	w/o Student Aid
Baseball	2017	$55,000	$746,007	-$691,007	$239,865	-$451,142
Baseball	2018	$74,433	$766,272	-$691,839	$266,800	-$425,039
Baseball	2019	$80,259	$775,016	-$694,757	$272,150	-$422,607

As you can see, baseball generates lower total operating revenues than total operating expenses, resulting in a fairly consistent deficit around $700K.  Even ignoring the scholarship expenses, which are not an economic cost, results in BGSU having a deficit of over $400K per fiscal year.

Using the EADA data, I looked up for each fiscal year the following:
Full-time Equivalent Male Counts and Female Counts; and Male student aid and Female Student Aid.

I calculate the following (in terms of percentages):

Name	FY	Male%	Female%	Male-Aid%	Female-Aid%	Difference
Bowling Green	2017	43.18%	56.82%	61.55%	38.45%	18.37%
Bowling Green	2018	43.21%	56.79%	64.17%	35.83%	20.96%
Bowling Green	2019	43.93%	56.07%	60.44%	39.56%	16.50%

Since the Title IX "prong 1" test states that universities are in compliance if they are +/- 1% of the ratio of full time equivalent males to male athletic aid, and BGSU is +18.37%, this means that BGSU is not meeting this test, BUT it does not mean that BGSU is not in compliance.

BGSU can make an argument that eliminating baseball is meeting Title IX "prong 2" now.

US Women's Soccer Salary Discrimination

Last week a judge threw out the US Women's Soccer Salary Discrimination part of their lawsuit against US Soccer.  As I pondered last year, the judge seemed to view the way the US Men's and US Women's salaries are paid under a collective bargaining agreement as being different.  Thus, the judge seems to have ruled that US Soccer is not paying the US Men and US Women differently because they are discriminating against female soccer players, but rather the salaries between the two groups are different because the two groups have chosen different ways to be paid.

Since the ways they are paid are different, then it's not salary discrimination.  I am not convinced that is always true, but it would be substantially more difficult to show that salary discrimination occurs; unfortunately for the US Women's Soccer players.

Old Dominion Recommends Dropping Wrestling

Last month, Andy Schwarz tweeted about Old Dominion University's (ODU) decision to drop wrestling.

I looked at the Old Dominion study that was used to justify the termination of ODU's wrestling program. https://t.co/UGrhTBtuy7

Even though the report asserts ODU is likely to face under-enrollment problems, there was no assessment of ...

— Andy Schwarz (@andyhre) April 5, 2020

My takeaway is the following:  dropping wrestling achieves two major goals - reducing a program making a financial loss and allows ODU to be compliant with Title IX.

ODU is adding women's volleyball in an effort to be in compliance with Title IX, because ODU does not currently meet the first "prong" of the options to be in compliance with Title IX, but by adding women's volleyball ODU is in compliance with the second "prong" of the Title IX compliance test. (The three "prongs" are laid out on page 6 of the ODU document linked here).  If ODU's athletic department cuts $250,000 in male scholarships and adds $250,000 in female scholarships then they will be in compliance using the first "prong" of the Title IX compliance test.

Since they are unable to drop a women's program due to Title IX requirements and ODU is unwilling to drop men's football, men's basketball and women's basketball, what must be done to meet the Title IX compliance test?  The three men's sports that could achieve this result are baseball, soccer and wrestling.  The author states that ODU baseball and ODU men's soccer are competitive for Conference USA conference championships, so that leaves wrestling - which the document states is not competitive for Conference USA conference championships.

So, is this accurate?  From the numbers I have, it seems to be.
Dropping wrestling:
1.) drops a program that is incurring a financial deficit to the athletic department.

Here are the wrestling programs total operating revenues, total operating expenses and surplus (+) or deficit (-) for fiscal years 2017, 2018 and 2019 that ODU provides to the NCAA.
 

FY	Total Op. Rev.	Total Op. Exp	Surplus/Deficit
2017	$53,148	$962,047	-$908,899
2018	$53,647	$941,218	-$887,571
2019	$113,546	$1,021,456	-$907,910

You will notice the wrestling program results in a deficit each of the last three fiscal years.  Yet, Andy raises a great point, regarding if scholarships (which are an accounting cost, but not an economic cost) are taken into account. 

Dropping wrestling:
2.) helps the athletic department reach "prong" 1 of the Title IX requirements (along with the addition of adding the women's volleyball program). 

FY	Student Aid
2017	$332,369
2018	$338,629
2019	$356,140

Since I have the student aid data for the ODU wrestling program during this time period, I subtracted out the scholarship costs to see if this would turn the deficit above into a surplus.  It does not.  I have also added the number of wrestling participants and the number of scholarships for the wrestling program over those three fiscal years as well.

FY	Surplus/Deficit w/o Student Aid	Partici- pants	Scholarships
2017	-$576,530	35	11.04
2018	-$548,942	36	10.28
2019	-$551,770	35	10.41

2019 NFL Attendance Analysis

Here is a quick look at regular season home attendance over the 2002-2019 NFL regular seasons, using total league home game attendance data from profootballreference.

First, overall, total league home game attendance dropped in 2019 by 137,542 fans.  While the drop seems large, historically this total league home game attendance decline is not unusual - and compared to the previous season - is not a statistically significant drop in total league home game attendance.  For those interested in a graph of total league home game attendance, here it is.

Second, in terms of increases in team home game attendance from the previous season, the five biggest gainers were:

Team		Change
Washington Redskins		35679
Buffalo Bills		31018
Indianapolis Colts		15288
Cleveland Browns		13326
San Francisco 49ers		9253

In terms of decreases in team home game attendance from the previous season, the five biggest gainers were:

Team		Change
Jacksonville Jaguars		-47903
Oakland Raiders		-35042
Cincinnati Bengals		-28596
Kansas City Chiefs		-20057
Miami Dolphins		-19940

 Yet, overall team home game attendance is not different from the 2018 team home game attendance in a statistically significant manner.

The Most Consistently Excellent NHL Goalie: Patrick Roy

One thing the data reveals about NHL goalies is that most NHL goalies are consistently inconsistent overall.  But not all are.  Now I want to turn to looking at the NHL goalies that are consistently consistent.  How do measure it?  I propose the following:  for an individual season, each NHL goalies performance using WAA is "graded" as follows: if they are in the top 20% of all NHL goalies for that season, they get an A, if they are in the next 20%, they get a B, and so on.  Then an NHL goalie is consistent if they maintain their grade from one season to another.  But I only am interested in the highest level of consistent performance, so I only count NHL goalies that from one season to another are among the top 20% of NHL goalies from the 1955/56 season to the 2019/20 season.  Thus, they have to be consecutively in the top 20% of NHL goalies for each season to be counted on the list.

The most consistently excellent NHL goalie performance over their career was by Patrick Roy.

Here are the Top 10 Consistently Excellent NHL Goalies

1. Patrick Roy (16):  1986/87-2002/03
2. Tony Esposito (11):  1969/70-1980/81
3. Billy Smith (9):  1974/74-1983/84
-. Dominic Hasek (9):  1992/92-2001/02
5. Glenn Resche (7):  1974/75-1981/1982
-. Henrik Lundquist (7):  2008/09-2015/16
-. Roberto Luongo (7):  2000/01-2008/09
8. Felix Potvin (5):  1991/92-1996/97
-. Jean-Sebastien Giguere (5): 2001/02-2007/08
-. Tomas Vokum (5):  2005/06-2010/11

The Greatest NHL Goalie: Ken Dryden

Recently, I posted that Bernie Parent was the greatest NHL goalie (since 1955/56, the season where the NHL started to record shots against, which I need to make the calculation of goalie production).  Well leave it to an economist to provide more than one answer to one question - Who is the greatest NHL goalie?

Bernie Parent had the highest Wins Above Average (WAA) for a single season, and that is one way of evaluating who the greatest (or most productive) NHL goalie ever was. 

Yet, there are other ways, and one of those is to take a look at career WAA and find out who had the highest career average WAA.  Running the number since the 1955/56 season, the NHL goalie with the highest average WAA was Ken Dryden (by a large margin).

Here is a list of the Top 10 NHL goalies in terms of career WAA:

1.   Ken Dryden
2.   Tony Esposito
3.   Dominik Hasek
4.   Patrick Roy
5.   Bernie Parent
6.   Jacques Plante
7.   Johnny Bower
8.   Tim Thomas
9.   Roberto Luongo
10. Glenn Hall

The Greatest NHL Goalie: Bernie Parent

What is the "greatest"?  Greatest could be the absolute best in terms of some metric.  Greatest could be the most times in the top 10/20/25/100 using some metric.  Greatest could be the most consistent top performances.  Greatest could be ...

Today I am going to attempt to answer this question:  Who is the Greatest NHL Goalie in terms of productivity?  So how is goalie productivity measured?  In a paper published in the Journal of Sports Economics, David Berri and I came up with a way of measuring NHL Goalie production using a concept called Wins Above Average (WAA).  WAA uses save percentage as the main determinant of goalie productivity.

Save percentage is a simple and straightforward way of measuring NHL goalie productivity.  Other measures such as, wins (often used) is more of a team measure, while goals against average is also more of a defensive measure.  When all else fails, how well does the goal keep a shot on goal out of the net; that is our measure of goalie productivity.  You are more than welcome to quibble with this idea, but it is simple and easily justified; so I am staying with it.

WAA is measured as:  the absolute value (since a goal against has a negative effect on team wins) of the marginal value of a goal against divided by two (since each win is worth two standings points) times, the number of shots on goal that goalie faces times the difference in the save percentage of the goalie and the average save percentage of all goalies for that season.

Given the NHL started to collect Shot Attempts beginning with the 1955/56 season, I have collected all the NHL goalie data (from NHL.com) going back to the 1955/56 season to the present.  Then I calculated each season's average save percentage; and then calculated WAA for the nearly 4000 goalies that played in the NHL since the 1955/56 season.  Ranking the NHL goalies from highest to lowest results in Bernie Parent to have the highest WAA since 1955/56.  Using a GA coefficient of -0.34, yields Bernie Parent's WAA = 12.282 for the Philadelphia Flyers in the 1973/74 season (the "Flyers Win the Stanley Cup" as announced by Gene Hart).