As it turns out, Utah athletic director Chris Hill doesn’t have to wait four years for his school’s full share of the conference TV money to kick in. He’s already cashing in on upgrading to the Pac-12.
Less than a year after moving up from the Mountain West, Hill already has raised $8.5 million from boosters. That’s $2 million more than his average. Next week’s inaugural Pac-12 championship game will earn Utah more than $2 million.
He received only $2 million in TV money for the entire year from the Mountain West.
Hill didn’t sell his school’s soul to join the Pac-12. Yes, one condition of Utah’s membership was it would get zero money from the old TV contract this year. Also, when the Pac-12’s new TV deals start giving each school $20 million next fall, Utah would receive 50 percent in 2012, 75 percent in 2013, then 100 percent in 2014.
In the long run, Hill knew it would pay off. In fact, it has paid off in the short run.
“I’m a realist,” Hill said Wednesday. “The Pac-12 wasn’t in desperation mode to add. We’re not from a BCS conference.”
Commissioner Larry Scott asked Utah to join for the fall of 2012. When Hill said they wanted to join in time for this football season, Scott said there was no new TV money available.
Fine, Hill said. Now his school is not only getting richer but it may continue its championship mode. The Utes (7-4, 4-4 Pac-12) host Colorado (2-10, 1-7) in today’s Expansion Bowl. Utah will win the inaugural South Division title if it wins, USC beats visiting UCLA and host Arizona State loses to California.
These are heady times for a Utah athletic department that felt it needed to close the league’s gap among athletic departments but not on the field. Now that football has become a force again after an 0-4 conference start, Hill can get the Utes on par elsewhere.
Ground will be broken in December on a $30 million, 120,000-square-foot football facility scheduled for completion by spring 2013. Hill has raised $16 million from donors. The other $14 million will come from a bond. The TV money will come right on time.
“We’ll pay it off quickly,” Hill said.
Utah is one of eight Pac-12 schools planning major renovations to its revenue sports facilities. In the Mountain West, Utah could get an edge simply by adding an indoor football practice facility. It had a big edge when it renovated Rice-Eccles Stadium for the 2002 Winter Olympics.
Not anymore. Hill said he’s hoping to improve facilities in tennis and softball and build a basketball practice facility.
“What do we need to be a player in the Pac-12?” Hill said. “What do we spend? We aren’t able to ratchet up every sport every year. Our salaries need to be competitive. Our goal is to grow programs and develop the funding needed to match up.”
Finances weren’t the only consideration in improving neighborhoods. Remember, Utah has gone undefeated twice and didn’t get any closer to the national championship game than fans did. The Mountain West didn’t have enough clout.
In 2004, the Urban Meyer-coached Utes went 13-0 and routed Pittsburgh in the Fiesta Bowl. In the 2008 season, Kyle Whittingham took the Utes to the Sugar Bowl and beat Alabama 31-17 to finish second in the AP poll.
It’s no surprise that Hill is a fan of the Plus-One, a popular proposal which would put the top four teams at season’s end in semifinals and a final.
“I’m a proponent of everybody being able to compete at the highest level,” he said. “Now we have that opportunity. We’re not starting a 100-meter dash 10 meters behind.”
So how much anger filtered through the campus three seasons ago when Utah was the lone undefeated team, had just beaten Alabama and stayed home for the national title game?
“It’s interesting. People were all excited,” Hill said. “We all had a group hug.”
John Henderson: 303-954-1299, jhenderson@denverpost.com or
Utah visitors guide
Game-day traditions
The Ute Walk starts from the football center and goes down Guardsman Way to the stadium about two hours before kickoff.
Sports bar
Lumpy’s, 3000 S. Highland Drive, 801-484-5597. The original Utes bar is a classic, two-story beer bar catering to all things Utes with scattered cheap shots at rival Brigham Young. Unfortunately, they no longer sell their old signature micro brew, Polygamy Porter. Slogan: “Why Have Just One?”
Restaurant
New Yorker, 60 W. Market St., 801-363-0166. In the 1906 New Yorker building, this is a high-end steak and seafood place with an air of New York in the prosperous, post-stock market crash 1940s. It’s not cheap but is a Salt Lake City tradition.
John Henderson, The Denver Post
