Several UK opponents trimming budgets in response to economic fallout from pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic has affected and will continue to impact every opposing school on Kentucky’s football schedule for the foreseeable future. For some, the monetary effects have already been made clear.
Two schools this week — Eastern Michigan, whom Kentucky is scheduled to play in its Sept. 5 season opener, and South Carolina, whom it’s scheduled to play on Sept. 26 — announced, in addition to possible plans for re-opening their campuses this fall, pay cuts to members of their athletic administration and coaching staffs. They joined Kent State, whom UK is set to host on Sept. 19, and which announced pay reductions and its re-opening scenarios earlier this month, and in-state Louisville, one of the first schools to announce cuts in response to the economic setbacks spurred by the pandemic.
Football coach Chris Creighton was among the Eastern Michigan coaches taking a voluntary 7-percent pay reduction that will last through at least July, according to The Detroit News. About 70 coaches and staffers in total at EMU took pay reductions and will have their work hours reduced by 40 percent. The university also has freezes in effect on spending and university-sponsored travel.
South Carolina football coach Will Muschamp, along with school president Bob Caslen, athletics director Ray Tanner, men’s basketball coach Frank Martin and women’s basketball coach Dawn Staley, agreed to 10-percent pay reductions that will be in effect through the end of the 2020-21 school year. It was the first member of the Southeastern Conference to announce pay reductions in its athletic department.
Muschamp, who agreed to a reduced salary following the 2019 season, was set to make $4.4 million for the 2020 season prior to the cut. The cumulative savings across those volunteers is expected to exceed $1.2 million.
“It’s the right thing to do,” Muschamp said during a Tuesday radio appearance. “It’s what is best for our institution and what is best for our state. I know what we’re going through, hopefully it’s not going to be as bad as we think it’s going to be, but a financial crisis here on campus, not just in the athletic department, but the entire university and our state. It’s the right thing to do.”
The University of Kentucky in April announced furloughs for more than 1,700 employees, most of them at UK HealthCare, but as of Wednesday had not announced pay reductions for any administrators. UK Athletics, which is financially self-sustaining, has not announced any cost-saving measures or cuts.
UK head football coach Mark Stoops twice during the pandemic has told reporters that he’s open to taking a reduction in pay, and says he’s brought the subject up multiple times with Director of Athletics Mitch Barnhart. Stoops is set to make $5 million during the 2020 season.
Louisville’s athletic department in April announced furloughs and a department-wide budget cut of 15 percent, which was in addition to 10-percent salary reductions for its coaches and senior staff members that had been announced previously.
Kent State football coach Sean Lewis is among the coaches at that institution who took a 10-percent salary reduction for fiscal year 2021, the school announced this month. That reduction later will be re-evaluated for possible extension into fiscal year 2022.
KSU, like Kentucky, is considering different re-opening scenarios that could include enhanced remote and hybrid coursework.
Eastern Illinois — the lone Football Championship Subdivision school on UK’s schedule for the 2020 season — has not announced any cuts but is still dealing with the ramifications from a state budget crisis dating back to 2017. In 2018, it made the decision to reduce scholarships across all of its 21 sports.
