Postseason absence for men's basketball hurts bottom line

With the Terrapin men's basketball team's decision to forgo participation in postseason tournaments this season, the university's financially strapped athletics department will lose a potential revenue source that it's enjoyed for the past 18 years, an official said yesterday.

Because of revenue sharing among participants, the athletics department has regularly turned a profit when the Terps compete in postseason play, including the second-tier NIT. But with the team's season at an end after being left out of the NCAA Tournament and NIT on Sunday night, Senior Associate Athletics Director Randy Eaton said the department will not receive the additional revenue it could have earned from agreeing to play in some kind of tournament.

"In almost all these cases, it may not be a lot of revenue, but it certainly doesn't cost you anything to participate in these tournaments," Eaton said in a telephone interview yesterday. "It's different every year. It fluctuates wildly every year. Again, it's based off revenue sharing."

Even after the Terps' name wasn't called during ESPNU's unveiling of the 32-team NIT bracket late Sunday night, the program still had other postseason opportunities.

Two third-tier tournaments — the College Basketball Invitational and the CollegeInsider.com Tournament — offered refuge for teams, such as the Terps, that were left out on Selection Sunday. But coach Gary Williams and Athletics Director Kevin Anderson ultimately decided against playing in either of the 16- or 24-team fields, respectively.

"I have no interest in playing in that tournament," Williams told The Washington Post on Sunday night when asked about the CIT.

Eaton said "finances played zero part" in that decision. Unlike the NCAA Tournament and NIT, the CBI and CIT both require a fee to host games. To help cover the travel and lodging costs of road teams, the CBI charges teams $35,000 to host the first round, $50,000 for the second round and $75,000 for the third and fourth rounds. The CIT, which normally attracts smaller Division I programs, costs host teams $31,500 per game.

Both tournaments, however, have promoted themselves to potential schools by claiming hosts of previous tournaments have made a profit.

"Was finances one of the pivotal decision points? Absolutely not," Eaton said. "We didn't even research finances."

The extra funds could have been a boost for the 27-sport, $55 million department, which has been forced to make budget cuts in recent years due in part to lagging ticket sales and a struggling economy.

In the end, though, the Terps decided continuing their season any further wasn't in the program's best interests.

"None of those tournaments ever had a former national championship-caliber team participate in them," Eaton said. "Neither one of them."

ceckard@umdbk.com