Big 12 Ranks 5th in Revenue, 3rd in School Payouts Among P5

The Big 12 finished the past fiscal year with the lowest amount of revenue among the Power Five conferences, but did pay out its schools the third highest amount. This data became public knowledge thanks to tax returns being publicly released by the conferences on Friday.

Overall, the conference reported $480.6 million in revenue and a school payout between $42 – $44.9 million. That payout slightly edges out the ACC ($37.9 million to $41.3 million) and the Pac-12 ($37 million) but falls significantly behind the Big Ten ($58.8 million) and SEC ($49.9 million).

Total amount distributed by each Power 5 conference PER SCHOOL in 2021-22 fiscal year via @usatodaysports:

Big Ten $58.8 million
SEC $49.9 million
Big 12 $42-$44.9 million
ACC $37.9-$41.3 million
Pac-12 $37 million

— Brett McMurphy (@Brett_McMurphy) May 19, 2023

Seeing how the Big 12 fares against the ACC and Pac-12 will be interesting moving forward. Part of the higher payout this year is the inclusion of Texas and Oklahoma, plus only 10 schools to split the money between. Texas and Oklahoma will forgo $100 million from next year that will be distributed among the eight schools that stayed, likely increasing their payouts for the next fiscal year.

The Big 12 will also add four more schools (BYU, Cincinnati, Houston, and UCF), but they will not start out at full conference payouts. How much each school will make when all is said and done is unknown and varies significantly across outlets. Some report that they can go below $40 million a school average, while others report that it may increase to over $50 million. Regardless, it’s likely to remain on par with the ACC and Pac-12.

That is, of course, assumes the Pac-12 figures things out. They still haven’t settled on a new TV deal, making their future revenue uncertain. The Pac-12 received the fourth-highest revenue ($580.9 million), but that will actually be smaller as they have to repay Comcast due to overpayments in their TV deal over the years. Each school received, on average, about $37 million, but their future is significantly more uncertain than the Big 12’s as they have yet to replace USC and UCLA, have yet to sign a TV deal, and still have to repay Comcast.

It’ll be interesting to see how the order of things change moving forward as the Big Ten and SEC, which already are far above the other three Power Five conferences, will likely see significant increases with major additions in (USC/UCLA – Big Ten, Texas/Oklahoma – SEC) as well as new lucrative TV deals. Power Five conferences reported $3.3 billion in combined revenue, with the Big Ten ($845.6 million) and SEC ($802 million) combining for approximately half of that.