Warner Pacific University in Portland, Oregon allocated $232,268 to women’s basketball teams in 2024, placing the school $484,622 below the state average of $716,890, according to the U.S. Department of Education.
Women’s basketball represented 10.2% of all sports team spending at Warner Pacific University during 2024.
Warner Pacific University’s total expenditures on sports have risen 104.9% since 2010.
With football, basketball is among the most widely followed college sports in the United States, drawing enthusiastic fans and television audiences comparable to those of the NBA. Annual tournaments such as March Madness garner millions of viewers.
College sports programs are adjusting to a landscape that now allows direct payments from schools to athletes following a federal settlement permitting institutions to share revenue with players. The settlement also directs the NCAA to pay $2.8 billion in damages to athletes competing from 2016 onward, to be disbursed over 10 years.
Athletes since 2022 have also gained the right to profit from their names, images and likenesses, following changes to state laws and NCAA policy that came after extended legal and legislative pressures.
For fiscal year 2024, the NCAA reported roughly $900 million in revenue from March Madness and television rights connected with the Division I men’s basketball tournament, making basketball its leading revenue generator.
| Year | Basketball team’s expenditures | % from grand total sport team expenditures |
|---|---|---|
| 2020 | $169,519 | 8.5% |
| 2021 | $155,021 | 7.6% |
| 2022 | $90,932 | 8% |
| 2023 | $120,968 | 7.7% |
| 2024 | $232,268 | 10.2% |
Information in this story was obtained from the U.S. Department of Education. The source data can be found here.
