The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
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18 THE WOLVERINE SEPTEMBER 2019 BY JOHN BORTON W arde Manuel worked his way up through the Michi- gan athletic department's chain of command back in the 1990s, long before becoming ath- letic director at Buffalo, then Connecti- cut and eventually back at his alma mater. Starting out, he could never have imagined an athletic department bud- get of nearly $200 million annually. "I've seen some graphs, I believe in Sports Business Journal, where they showed the rise in television revenue per school, per conference," Manuel explained. "It's been a significant growth. You can look at tuition and the way it's grown. "There are a lot of things that have grown very quickly over time, and in a compounded way, it makes it signifi- cant. It's not something I would have imagined." He can imagine it now. Michigan's projected budget for the 2020 fiscal year came in at $196.3 million, both in anticipated revenues and expenses. That represents an increase of ap- proximately $6 million from the $190.7 million projected for the final fiscal year 2019 revenues, reported earlier this summer to the University Board of Regents. At that time, Michigan's AD anticipated $189.7 million in expenses, and the department still expects to come in with a surplus of roughly $1 million. Manuel told the Regents the $1 mil- HIGH-STAKES SPORTS Michigan's Athletic Budget Approaches $200 Million Director of athletics Warde Manuel noted that the revenue from the football team provides much of the money for the athletic department and said: "I just feel a tremendous amount of happiness that our fans continue to support football at a high level, so we can do all that we do." PHOTO BY LON HORWEDEL