Big-Time Bucks For Big East Bulls
By ALAN SNEL asnel@tampatrib.com
Published: Dec 3, 2005
TAMPA - -- BullsHeaven store owner Jeffrey Neil Fox has invested more than $500,000 on the hunch that the University of South Florida's move to the Big East Conference will pay off in fans buying USF Bulls caps, shirts and souvenirs.
Bright House Networks, the area's primary cable-TV supplier, signed a multimillion-dollar, five-year deal this fall hoping to leverage USF's new role as a Big East member to broadcast Bulls games on TV.
Shawn Pulford and Jim Zmirich of Alexander Reid Land Development LLC spent $2 million to convert a former Hops Restaurant Bar & Brewery on Fowler Avenue into an eatery with a USF sports theme called the Bull Ring, hoping to capitalize on the buzz around USF and the Big East.
USF's inaugural year in the Big East, one of the country's major sports conferences, has meant a spike in Bulls sports-related business off campus and at university sporting events.
Besides restaurants and merchandisers trying to cash in on USF's move to the Big East from Conference USA, USF's athletic department expects a windfall in ticket revenue thanks to its football and basketball teams drawing more fans.
"Everything is timing. USF has come of age. We want to get their merchandise out there," said Fox, a 1975 USF graduate and president of Authentic Team Merchandise, which opened the BullsHeaven store on North Florida Avenue on Thursday.
Fox signed a deal with USF in September to be the Bulls' official licensed merchandiser, which allows him to sell logo gear at games. Fox also is partnering with Pulford and Zmirich to sell Bulls merchandise at the Bull Ring restaurant.
The Bull Ring's owners are aiming for first-year revenue of $2 million to $2.5 million and hope to double those numbers in five to six years, said Bill Haines, the restaurant's general manager. The restaurant, which opens Dec. 16, will have 40 to 45 employees, including USF athletes, he said.
The decision to open the restaurant "was done with the awareness that USF was entering the Big East this year," Haines said.
"The Big East is a brand name, and it's a bigger market," Fox said. "It's big-time."
Case in point: Tonight's USF-West Virginia football game in Tampa would have decided the Big East championship had the Bulls defeated the University of Connecticut a week ago. But USF lost, dooming its Sugar Bowl bid.
The team, having a 6-4 season, still might play in its first bowl game: either the Meineke Car Care Bowl in Charlotte, N.C., or the Motor City Bowl in Detroit. The Meineke Bowl pays $1.1 million to each school that plays, and a Big East team that plays in the Motor City Bowl also would get $1.1 million.
USF, like the seven other Big East football members, splits $12.5 million from various bowl games and can make extra money based on its Big East conference finish and the particular bowl it plays in, said Rick Costello, USF associate athletic director and chief financial officer. Even if the team doesn't play in a bowl game, USF can expect at least $1.5 million from that arrangement, he said.
This is USF's fifth year playing Division 1A football, college's highest level. The football program's only coach, Jim Leavitt, signed a seven-year, $7 million deal this week.
USF actual attendance at Raymond James Stadium averaged 32,231 a game this season, compared with 19,757 a game for six contests in 2004, according to the Tampa Sports Authority, the public agency managing the stadium.
In addition, the USF basketball team will host colleges with high-profile round-ball traditions such as Villanova, DePaul, Connecticut and Georgetown during the 2005-06 season.
USF is upgrading its 10,411-seat Sun Dome on campus by installing scoreboards, adding more floor seats, replacing the floor surface, and looking into adding suites, said Tom Veit, associate director of athletics. Action Sports Media will sell advertisement space on the new scoreboard and is trying to get a naming rights deal for the dome, said Veit, a 1993 USF graduate.
USF will receive a revenue cut from the naming rights deal -- which would be a first for the building -- and from advertisement signs in the venue. But USF officials said the exact amount of revenue is secret under the Action Sports deal.
Ticket revenue from football and basketball games has increased 15 percent thanks to the Big East move, Costello said.
USF basketball attendance has no place to go but up: In 2004-05, average announced attendance was 3,220, including an average of 1,828 fans in the stands.
To market the move to the Big East, USF has a $250,000 annual budget to advertise games in local media.
"That's up from zero when I came here," said Veit, who started in March 2002.
USF plans to improve its other sports facilities and hopes to use the Big East's high profile to prompt alumni to donate money, said Doug Woolard, USF athletic director.
Murray Sperber, a former English and American studies professor at Indiana University who has published several books on college sports spending, cautioned that USF's move to the Big East will mean the university will have to spend more to compete.
"The bad news is that they're competing for a leisure dollar in a very tough town. I don't see it getting much better after this year," Sperber said. "I can't imagine they're going to make money. Playing in the Big East means they will have serious travel costs."
<a href='http://news.tbo.com/news/MGBK4IY9RGE.html' target='_blank'>Tampa Tribune</a>
This is one reason why UCF needs a travel partner in UCF.
