“OK,” Nell Fortner said. “You want to go there?”
Fortner – the Georgia Tech women’s basketball coach – was ready to answer the question. She has thought quite a lot about how the shifting landscape in college athletics might impact sports that aren’t football.
Tuesday was women’s basketball media day for the ACC. Three months ago, the conference held a similar event for football at the same venue, Charlotte’s Westin hotel. The highly discussed topic then was about conference realignment — which involves, in short, the reshaping of membership in college athletic conferences as schools pursue bigger paychecks from football television contracts. It’s something that can dramatically shift competition and income for major programs. That annual gathering of ACC football coaches sitting in front of microphones came on the heels of the news that the University of Southern California and UCLA were leaving the Pac-12 to join the Big Ten.
That move was driven by money. Specifically, money that comes from television revenue from college football contracts.
And so were the ones that preceded it — like in the summer of 2021, when Texas and Oklahoma revealed their intentions to leave the Big 12 and join the Southeastern Conference, which knocked down a flurry of dominoes as schools pursued more visibility, bigger platforms and bigger pieces of the television revenue pie.
Conference realignment has the power to change what college sports look like. Consider that, in the year that followed Texas and Oklahoma announcing their move to the SEC, 18 other schools changed their conference affiliation.
The Big 12 went out and raided the American Athletic Conference, taking three of its teams. And then the AAC reloaded with six teams from Conference USA, and then a few remaining Conference USA schools jumped from what looked like a sinking ship into the Sun Belt. And then a handful of openings paved the way for schools like James Madison, Sam Houston State and Jacksonville State to jump up to the Football Bowl Subdivision. For a while, it seemed like a trickle-down effect would never end.
Many have predicted a future with a “Power Two” conference system, where — again, because of television revenue from football — the Big Ten and SEC are the haves, and all the other conferences, including the ACC, are the have nots.
“I don't know what the end result is going to be. But it's going to look different than it does now,” Fortner said Tuesday. “And I don't think we should be scared of it.”
How football-drive realignment impacts other sports
When most folks talk about realignment, the only sport they’re talking about is football. The reality is, when a team switches conferences, it doesn’t impact just one sport.
Let’s get selfish here – how are we going to take care of men’s and women’s basketball? Do we have to have all these conferences? Does that have to be the way?Nell Fortner, Georgia Tech women's basketball coach
When USC and UCLA start playing in the Big Ten, all of their teams – not just football – are going to have to play games against fellow Big Ten members in Piscataway, New Jersey and College Park, Maryland. This means that UCLA and USC’s volleyball, soccer and softball teams — and every other sport the Bruins and Trojans play — are going to have to make these trips across multiple time zones.
That’s a whole lot of air miles logged and time away from class for people who we’re supposed to call “student athletes.”
For football, that’s not a huge deal. College football teams typically play a 12-game regular season with one game a week that is usually on a Saturday. Women’s college basketball teams play 27 to 29 regular season games a year, and do so on various nights of the week.
This is how women’s sports can be overlooked and become an afterthought when football-driven decisions force conference realignment.
It is the opinion of Fortner that football shouldn’t be determining choices for other sports.
“To me, football is football. And they need to just go do what's best for football,” Fortner said. “[Football is] a big, big, big business. [Football] shouldn’t be making decisions on if the swim team flies across the country; that shouldn’t be part of their decision.”
But football is the money maker. Reports indicate that the Big Ten will net around $71.8 million per-school annually from football TV revenue beginning in 2024. That money could help build new school buildings and athletic facilities for Big Ten schools.
The ACC is pretty far behind. They’re locked into a television contract with ESPN that runs through 2036. In the 2020-21 fiscal year, it paid out about $36.1 million per school.
UNC women’s basketball coach Courtney Banghart identified that “arms race” as a “challenge.”
“It's a concern,” said Banghart, who is also the vice president of the Women’s Basketball Coaches Association. “You got to do your job well and let other people do their job well. So, the people who make those decisions have to recognize that, like anything, money is a part of this. And the more money, the better the opportunities you have to win some battles in recruiting, or to have some facilities, or to have a student athlete experience in a different way. And so, smart people are making those decisions for us and I'll just focus on getting a good team and making that work.”
Still, Fortner is worried about her sport. And she’s been around it – and college athletics – quite a while.
The 63-year-old is entering her fourth season coaching the Yellow Jackets, but also previously coached at Auburn and Purdue, and led the U.S. women’s national team to an Olympic gold in Sydney in 2000. In her 12 seasons of coaching college basketball, Fortner has taken her teams to the NCAA Tournament six times. She’s also worked for ESPN, where she was on broadcast teams for volleyball and basketball.
“How are we going to take care of basketball? Let’s get selfish here – how are we going to take care of men’s and women’s basketball? Do we have to have all these conferences? Does that have to be the way? I don’t know. I don’t have the answer,” Fortner said. “I’m just saying, it just seems like at some point in time, the discussion has to be – football has to take care of football. Let them do that.”
She added: “And then, now, let’s figure out how the rest of this works. And we don’t have to fly teams from coast to coast to compete in a conference. That makes no sense to me.”
Fortner is ultimately suggesting a split between football and the rest of college athletics.
“Because for basketball, look man, March Madness is the real thing. We have something to sell,” Fortner said. “We have something that’s viable, that’s huge, that we need to take care of – and not let it be driven by what football decides for football.”
Women’s basketball can make money, too
Indeed, the women’s NCAA basketball tournament is undervalued. Currently, its television rights are part of a package with 28 other collegiate sports tournaments that pays out just $34 million annually. But a report in 2021 from Kaplan Hecker & Fink LLP found that the women’s college basketball tournament should be able to earn a television contract that pays out $81 million to $112 million annually – all on its own. That contract that currently includes women’s college basketball is up in 2024.
Another ACC coaching veteran, Miami’s Katie Meier – who was hired in 2005, a year after the Hurricanes joined the conference from the Big East – is also a bit anxious about what realignment might do to women’s basketball.
“I really am concerned,” Meier said. “My eyes are on it… I don’t know what’s going to happen. So, there's just concern there, because I've just benefited from a great model.”
Banghart didn’t have a solution for conference realignment either, but the Tar Heels coach confessed a fear that she has that could stem from additional movement.
“I think losing the rivalries would be a problem,” Banghart said Tuesday. “I know we could build other ones… Carolina’s brand, thankfully, I think we’ll be alright no matter where we go.”
When a lot of folks think of the ACC, they think about UNC vs. Duke basketball. And, as Banghart says, “to have that broken up, would be a real bummer.”
