Budget cuts hit athletics
Tuesday, Jan. 22, 2008 @ 1:23 am
$600,000 to be cut from the department, less coaches to go on the road to recruit
Nevada football recruiting coordinator Jim Mastro has never had a big budget to bring in talent.
He doesn’t fly on his California visits, he rents the cheapest compact cars and even sleeps on his sister’s couch when he’s nearby.
But now, Mastro has to cut even more.
With state colleges asked to cut $58 million as handed down by Gov. Jim Gibbons, part of the near $600,000 cut from the athletics department will affect recruitment, the budget plan said.
“We really have to pinch our pennies,” said Mastro, who is also the team’s running backs coach. “You can’t control the uncontrollable and we have to use our money wisely.”
Football recruiting will take the biggest hit because the team has to recruit the most players of any sport on campus.
For example, the football team inked 19 players in last year’s recruiting class. Mastro will try to visit each player and his parents. Some players will commit over the phone, he said.
The cost of sending coaches to evaluate and sign players can really add up, he said.
As a result Mastro said that there will be less travel from the coaches and he won’t send anyone to Arizona for players. Nevada had 11 players from Arizona on last year’s roster.
“We’ve already got a plan in place,” said Mastro, who just completed his eighth season at Nevada. “I know where we can cut and where we can save.”
Nevada Director of Athletics Cary Groth said that other programs will cut back, but the majority of the money saved will come from her decision.
She said that staff traveling to postseason events will decrease. Groth said that a lot of money was spent last season sending staff to the Western Athletic Conference basketball tournament in Las Cruces, N.M., and to New Orleans for the first and second round of the NCAA Tournament.
She said that fewer people will go to the WAC Tournament this year.
Other cuts in the department include raises. The plan says it will defer faculty merit for six months, which is expected to save $22,000.
The other area of saving is to increase fund raising.
Groth said that no new fund raisers have been implemented, but the effort to raise more money will be enstated.
The savings there is expected to reach $230,000.
“Our big issue was to not take away anything from the student athletes,” Groth said.
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© 2008 The Nevada Sagebrush
January 22nd, 2008 at 11:04 am
No reason athletics should not have to cut back. Everyone else is on the hook.