Northwestern's $850M Stadium, Curt Cignetti's New Contract: Watch The Fuck Out SEC, The Basement of The B1G Could End You With the Snap of Their Fingers
That's a damn nice $850 million stadium, Northwestern. Reimagining the college football experience. Premium viewing for all fans. Not a bad seat in the house. Special sound amplifying roofs that might actually make Northwestern's student section audible. A skating rink. Everything the college football stadium of the future could and should be. It's all happening at little ol' Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.
I was thinking about this the other day. I'm admittedly not even sure how true it is. So I'm admittedly halfway talking out of my ass here, but I don't think I'm entirely wrong.
People in college football always talk about SEC money. When Curt Cignetti became a household name, people immediately started saying, "Good for Indiana, but once he gets a load of that SEC money he's out the door" ... "Florida will cut him a check that the Hoosiers will never be able to match."
Fast forward a few weeks, Indiana signs Cignetti to an 8-year, $72 million contract extension. $8 million per year with an annual $1 million per year extension bonus.
That's more money than Florida pays Billy Napier. More money than Texas A&M pays last offseason's hottest available coach, Mike Elko. More money than Auburn, Arkansas, and South Carolina are all paying their head coaches. SEC schools like to think that nobody can compete with them financially when it comes to football. But that couldn't be further from the truth. The rest of the country merely lets the SEC dominate college football. Schools like Indiana and Northwestern could flip the college football world on its head if they so choose. I think. Maybe. Correct me if I'm wrong.
I'm not exactly sure how to measure how much money a university has other than by looking at their endowment. So that's what I'll do. If you look at endowments, the idea of "SEC money" is a myth. The SEC doesn't have more money than anyone else. They've just been more willing to spend it on football. The SEC has dominated college football for as long as I can remember. But when it comes to money, with the exception of Texas and Texas A&M (who I'm assuming have oil money or something, and are only very recently SEC), I'm afraid the traditional SEC powers are a bunch of broke bitches.
A lot of B1G schools in that top 20. Some ACC as well. Not that Georgia & Alabama aren't large universities with sizable endowments. They both come in right around a respectable $2 billion. Being in the middle of the pack (public school-wise) is nothing to be ashamed about.
What the SEC doesn't want to think about, is that they are maxed out when it comes to how good they can be at football. Alabama and Georgia have all their chips in the middle. SEC schools currently put all their resources towards creating the best possible football team their university can produce. Football in the SEC right now is as good as SEC football will ever be.
But it doesn't have to be that way. There's an army of schools that could flip college football on it's head with the snap of their fingers. I'm not saying it's going to happen. It almost certainly will not. But now that schools can pay players directly. Now that schools like Indana have realized how fucking awesome it is to have a competitive football team… the SEC might start seeing some competition from the schools they've been laughing at their entire lives. Maybe we're seeing Northwestern go the Indiana route as well. Maybe your own Vanderbilt gets tired of being the conference punching bag and decides to take you down from within.
In a hypothetical world where colleges and universities across the country suddenly lose all their priorities and decide that the real measure of a school is how well they perform on the gridiron (i.e. what the SEC does now). Then the SEC is fucked. The SEC is maxed out. With the exception of the Texas school who apparently have more money than god. But even that would be a shame. If they let Texas and Texas A&M into the conference and within 10 years they've dwarfed the Alabama's and Georgia's of the world? That couldn't feel great.
I'm sure Alabama and Georgia will continue being premier college football programs for the remainder of my life. But just realize… that's only because Vanderbilt lets them. Ten years from now when Donald Trump has flipped this country on its head, and a degree from Harvard and Yale no longer means shit, the Ivy League might be forced to pivot drastically. They might get sick of trying when it comes to academics. They might realize, "Wait a second… Alabama isn't even spending $100 million a year on their football program? That's all it takes to be a part of this College Football Playoff thing? Fuck doing research that nobody cares about. Football looks way more fun. Let's invest our money that way."
That was the thought I had over the weekend. I'm sure there are many holes you can poke in my argument. Are those endowment numbers accurate? Great question. What even is an endowment exactly? Even better one. But deep down the SEC knows there's some truth to it. So enjoy the football success while you can southeastern United States. You never know when Stanford might wake up and decide to buy your entire conference.