Big Ten Conference revenues rise 33% in one year
With the addition of Maryland and Rutgers in July 2014, the Big Ten Conference began seriously flexing its financial strength, the conference’s new federal tax return shows.
The conference had $448.8 million in total revenue during a fiscal year ending June 30, 2015 — a figure that represents a nearly $110 million increase over what it pulled in during its 2014 fiscal year.
As a result, the conference distributed roughly $32.4 million to each of its longest-standing 11 members, amounts that put those schools on par with amounts the Southeastern Conference distributed to each of its 14 member schools from conference revenue that totaled $527.4 million.
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Nebraska, Maryland and Rutgers are each on separately negotiated paths to full shares of Big Ten revenue. In fiscal 2015, Nebraska received $19.8 million, Maryland $24.1 million and Rutgers nearly $10.5 million, according to the new return, which the conference provided Wednesday in response to a request from USA TODAY Sports.
The return also showed that the Big Ten loaned Maryland an additional $11.6 million. That money was an advance against future conference distributions, deputy commissioner Brad Traviolia said in an interview. Traviolia declined to discuss the reasons for the loan, but as part of a settlement to a legal dispute with the Atlantic Coast Conference over its exit fee, Maryland agreed in August 2014 to let the ACC keep more than $31 million in revenue share money the conference had been withholding from the school.
The additions of Maryland and Rutgers resulted in increased TV revenue for the Big Ten from deals that were renegotiated with the conference's TV partners, Traviolia said. Like other Power Five conferences, the Big Ten also got a revenue boost from the inaugural College Football Playoff.
Earlier Wednesday, the Pac-12 Conference released its new tax records, which showed $439 million in total revenue and per-school shares of about $25.1 million.
The Big Ten’s new return showed that commissioner Jim Delany was credited with nearly $2.3 million in total compensation during the 2014 calendar year. (Under IRS rules, a non-profit organization must report its revenue and expense data based on its fiscal year; but it must report compensation data based on the calendar year completed during its fiscal year.)
Delany’s pay represents a sizable decrease compared to what was reported for him for 2013, when he was credited with $3.4 million, including $1 million in bonus pay of which more than $800,000 had been reported as deferred on prior years’ returns.
In 2014, Delany had just more than $1.9 million in base pay (down from $2.05 million in 2013); nearly $275,000 in deferred compensation and no bonus.
Pac-12 commissioner Larry Scott was credited with a total of $4.05 million for 2014 on his conference’s new return, includes $2.55 million in base salary and $1.25 million in bonus pay. Then-SEC commissioner Mike Slive was credited with just under $3.7 million, nearly all of which was in the form of base pay.
Traviolia declined to detail the impact that adding Maryland and Rutgers had on the Big Ten's TV deals, but the conference's tax returns give some indication of the impact of adding the Washington and New York markets. The Big Ten annually provides a figure for what it terms "Sports Revenue." Based on the way the conference categorizes other revenue streams, "Sports Revenue" includes — but is not exclusively comprised of — TV revenue and revenue from football bowl games.
The conference reported about $317 million in "Sports Revenue" in fiscal 2014 and almost $397 million in 2015 — an $80 million difference. Based on reports from other conferences that approximate their bowl revenue increases from the CFP, it is likely that $50 million to $60 million of the Big Ten's "Sports Revenue" increase is attributable to the TV rights fee increases that resulted from adding Maryland and Rutgers.
The Big Ten's television strength was demonstrated on the new tax return in another way — the reporting of a $22.6 million dividend from Big Ten Network Holdings LLC, an amount that Traviolia said is connected to the conference's after-tax portions of Big Ten Network profits that it shares with network co-owner Fox. (The Big Ten Conference's share of those profits are in addition to a television rights fee payment it gets from the Big Ten Network, Traviolia said,)
Traviolia said that the $22.6 million in dividend money was used to provide the loan to Maryland, as well as $1 million of the amounts distributed to each of the conference's 11 longest-standing member schools.