Ohio State is projecting a decline of more than $130 million in athletics revenue for the 2020-21 academic year due to the cancellation of fall sports.
According to the agenda for the Board of Trustees' Audit, Compliance and Finance Committee meeting this week, where the university's financial plan for the 2021 fiscal year is set to be approved, Ohio State is set for a $130.3 million decrease in athletics revenue from the 2020 fiscal year “due to the cancelled fall athletics season and related ticket, media, conference, and game guarantee revenue.”
The projected $130.3 million decline assumes no fall sports, so it's uncertain how much of that revenue could be made up if football and other fall sports end up playing winter or spring seasons. While it's likely a winter football season played in neutral-site stadiums without fans would only make up a fraction of that revenue due to the loss of ticket sales – for fiscal year 2019, the last year for which Ohio State's annual NCAA financial report is available, nearly $60 million of OSU's $210.5 million in total athletics revenues for the year came from ticket sales – a winter season could enable Ohio State to make up for some of its lost revenue through media rights contracts and other conference payouts.
While the agenda does not specify if and where budget cuts will be made within the Ohio State athletics department, the university's financial plan for the 2021 fiscal year calls for $175 million in target budget reductions across the entire university due to its projected revenue losses resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic.
Even though the COVID-19 pandemic forced the university to issue refunds for on-campus housing and dining after the spring semester was completed remotely, Ohio State reported a positive net cashflow of $248 million for the 2020 fiscal year, in part thanks to $170 million in federal stimulus funds that Ohio State received from the CARES Act.
