WSU's Grant scrambling to trim budget

Athletic director is only about halfway through cutting  $1 million in costs.

Meininger shoots Elks past Alter in overtime
7:41 a.m.
Wright State still has hopes of hosting
2/13/12
Area athletes going on to play in college
2/13/12
Trotwood state football team being honored
2/13/12
Vandalia QB signs with Butler
2/13/12
> More sports headlines

By Marc Katz, Staff Writer Updated 11:23 PM Friday, July 31, 2009

FAIRBORN — Just a year on the job this weekend as Wright State’s athletic director, Bob Grant has been trying for weeks to avoid what so many other schools across the country are doing: cut sports and personnel.

It has proven to be an impossible assignment in a dramatically weak economic climate.

Only about halfway to trimming $1 million from a budget of about $10 million, Grant this week had to tell two longtime staffers — Assistant Athletic Director Matt Liddy and Assistant Communications Director Matt Zircher — their jobs were being eliminated.

Along with that, Grant has to deal with the NCAA-mandated gender equity policy. The school briefly fell out of compliance after the addition of a men’s track team three years ago, which has now been eliminated as one of the department’s cuts.

Even though there are more women than men participating in athletics at the school, the percentage was not as high as WSU’s general population of women.

Cutting the men’s track team was not as difficult as making other cuts, since many of the athletes on that team were on other teams at the school.

Cheerleaders and the dance team were not as fortunate.

Scholarships for students in those areas — always charged to the athletic department — have been eliminated, as has travel money.

“It affects a lot of people,” Grant said. “But they do a tremendous job of fundraising, and that will allow them to do many of the same things they do now.”

What else?

• There is a moratorium on flying for all nonbasketball teams unless funded by each sport’s fundraising capabilities.

• Other than basketball, coaches have been asked to recruit in-state student-athletes, thus reducing scholarship costs.

“And we will look at reducing scholarships over time,” Grant said.

• Budget restraints concerning travel, equipment and supplies.

“Do we really need three sets of practice uniforms?” Grant said. “Can we use game uniforms three years instead of two?”

The AD also said, “We’re drastically reducing summer-school spending. We used to always allow students to take as many summer-school classes as they wanted. Now we’re putting more pressure on our athletes to do more of their studies during the (regular school) year.”

• There will be limited media guides produced for all sports except men’s and women’s basketball. All other media guide information will be exclusively online.

Coaches, for the most part, are going along, although there are three vacancies yet to fill — golf, softball and cross country/track and field. At least one assistant’s position — swimming’s Paul Mangen left for another job — will not be filled.

“We have to be careful, not frugal,” tennis coach Sean McCaffrey said. “We’re working on obtaining some indoor court time with a local club through an advertising trade agreement instead of having to pay for time.

“We’ve also revamped our courts — I actually found a warranty in a desk here that paid for most of it — and sold some court-naming rights. By improving our facilities, more Ohio kids are going to want to come here.”

There also are cost-cutting measures being enacted by the Horizon League, of which WSU is a member. Instead of all 10 schools (who participate in each of these sports) attending their season-ending tournaments, only the top six teams in baseball, softball, soccer, volleyball and tennis will be invited.

Cutting expenditures is important. So is generating new revenue.

“We need to generate more money,” Grant said. “We’re going to work like crazy to get more people to our basketball games.”

Men’s basketball has helped in securing guarantees for away games. The men’s opening three-game tournament in Seattle in November will be covered by a $75,000 guarantee.

“We’ll be able to make money on that deal,” Grant said.

Contact this reporter

at (937) 225-2157 or

mkatz@DaytonDailyNews.com.

Share this article