LOUISVILLE, Ky, (WDRB) — Not every scoreboard hangs in the basketball arena. Some are posted in the executive boardroom.
According to an article in the Wall Street Journal this week, neither Florida nor Houston, the teams that played for the NCAA men’s basketball championship in San Antonio Monday night, ranks among the 25 most valuable programs in the men’s game.
But Louisville (No. 5), Kentucky (No. 9) and Indiana (No. 3) do.
The valuations are the work of Ryan Brewer, an associate professor of finance at Indiana University’s regional campus in Columbus.
The numbers are Brewer’s projections of what the programs would be worth if they could be bought and sold in the open market like professional sports franchises.
The Wall Street Journal story by Andrew Beaton said that Brewer examined revenues and cash flows. The financial projections were made about the team’s sustainability. (Story link. Wall Street Journal has a pay wall.)
Brewer placed the estimated value of U of L basketball at $260 million, Kentucky at $223 million and Indiana at $279 million. Western Kentucky ranked 155th at $17 million while Bellarmine was No. 249 at $11 million.
For comparison, the NBA Boston Celtics sold this year for $6.1 billion while new owners paid only $1.5 billion for the Minnesota Timberwolves.
Brewer also projected the value of Division I women’s basketball programs.
Louisville ranked 10th at $55 million, IU 14th at $50 million and Kentucky No. 17 at $46 million.
The top five men’s programs were North Carolina at $378 million, Duke at $370 million, IU, Ohio State at $262 million and U of L.
The only Final Four team other than Duke to crack the Top 30 was Auburn, which ranked No. 27 at $132 million. National champion Florida ranked 31st at $121 million with runner-up Houston placed 58th at $81 million.
These were the top 5 women’s programs: 1. UConn, $95 million; 2. South Carolina, $86 million; 3. Baylor $77 million; 4. Stanford, $74 million; 5. BYU, $60 million.
Valued at $10 million, the WKU women’s program ranked No. 200 while Bellarmine was valued at $7 million, No. 297.
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