PITCH: Board to discuss recently built college stadiums
of being an attractive addition to a BCS conference and its TV network,” Rosentraub told the Review-Journal.
“Such a linkage for its football and basketball programs would enhance TV revenues allowing UNLV’s athletic program to minimize dependency on any other revenue sources, including student fees,” Rosentraub said.
The Las Vegas TV market is the 40th largest in the country, but Rosentraub argued its growth will land the TV market in the mid-30s in future years.
Rosentraub on Thursday is scheduled to appear before the UNLV stadium board to discuss planned and recently built college stadiums.
The 11-member panel, made up of regents, casino company representatives and public officials, is studying the need, scope, cost and funding of a proposed stadium at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
UNLV previously floated a $900 million, 60,000-seat domed stadium concept with private developer Majestic Realty. But after cutting ties with Majestic, the university is partnering with Las Vegas’ casino-hotel industry — through the stadium board — to determine whether a dome is needed and recommend the proposed stadium’s number of seats, size and price.
Universities across the country have jumped from their traditional conferences to other conferences in the name of increased TV revenue. Consider schools such as Nebraska, Maryland and Rutgers, which have switched to the Big Ten.
The Big Ten has one of the biggest TV contracts in college sports. According to published reports, the Big Ten distributes $24 million to each school, with the TV payout spiking potentially to as much as $35 million in 2017, while the Pac 12 distributes about $21 million to each member school.
Those annual payments dwarf the $613,636 in national TV revenues that UNLV’s football program received this season. In total, networks pay more than $10 billion in annual college football broadcast rights.
Former banker and ex-casino executive Don Snyder, who is spearheading the university’s push for a stadium as chairman of the stadium board, acknowledged the linkage between a new venue and appeal to BCS conferences and their TV partners.
“BCS conferences help define both our athletic and academic aspirations, and the enhanced media revenues which would result will be good for the university as a whole,” Snyder said Monday.
Regent Cedric Crear, a stadium board member, likes the concept.
“That’s one of the many positive factors that plays into why a stadium on campus makes sense,” Crear said.
Pat Christenson, president of Las Vegas Events, the nonprofit that markets and promotes sports events and concerts in the region, warned that opening a new on-campus stadium is just one piece of the puzzle toward gaining membership in a BCS conference.
“It would enhance UNLV’s chances. It would be another piece of the puzzle to getting into a BCS conference, but a new stadium by itself wouldn’t get UNLV into a conference,” Christenson said Monday.