HOUSTON – During March Madness, NCAA Women’s Basketball teams have advantages for teams in the upper brackets over HBCUs and mid-major conference programs. Financially, the larger budgeted squads had a distinct advantage over programs with fewer resources. According to Sportico, during Dawn Staley’s 2022 National Championship run, South Carolina spent $9.5M on the operating expenses for the Gamecocks program in 2021-22.

DISPARITY BETWEEN JACKSON STATE, NORFOLK STATE, AND POWER CONFERENCES

No. 3 UConn (30-5) had $8.5 million in total operating expenses, 11x more than No. 14 Jackson State University (26-7) from 2021-22. According to EADA reported by the Jackson State athletic department for the 2022-23 season, the women’s basketball team’s total expenses were $894,572.00. Its game-day expenses for lodging, meals, transportation, uniforms, equipment, event costs, and officials were $218,802.00. That’s an average of $13,675.00 for 16 Lady Tigers basketball program participants.

A snapshot of the total 2022-23 operating expenses for the No. 3 UConn women’s basketball team was $10,468,272.00 for a difference of $9,573,700.00 to the Jackson State women’s basketball team. The staggering difference directly correlates with the top seeds dominating the lower seeds. Get this fact from Lev Akabas’ report, “Top three seeds are 347-1 historically in the round of 64 and have won all 41 titles. No. 1 seeds have won 10 of the past 11 national championships.”

Geno Auriemma expressed a concern for HBCUs and mid-major schools while playing in the NCAA Women’s Championship:

“I do think they suffer from the same thing that a lot of mid-major schools suffer, getting people that are at a high level, getting them to want to play you [Jackson State]. It’s really, really hard to put together a schedule when you’re in their situation because everybody just wants you to come to their place, and they’ll pay you some money to come there, but they’ll never come to your place and play.”