In 2024, Delgado Community College in New Orleans, Louisiana, spent $211,101 on its women’s basketball teams, which falls $1,034,841 below the state average expenditure of $1,245,942, according to the U.S. Department of Education.
This figure made up 23.3% of the college’s total athletic spending in the 2024 fiscal year.
Delgado Community College’s combined athletics expenses have climbed by 122% since 2010.
Basketball remains among the top collegiate sports in the U.S. along with football, with leading NCAA teams attracting fan bases and TV audiences on par with those of NBA games. Events like March Madness bring millions of viewers annually.
The landscape of college sports shifted as a federal settlement paved the way for schools to share revenue directly with athletes for the first time, while requiring the NCAA to distribute $2.8 billion in back damages over 10 years to athletes who participated since 2016.
By 2022, following years of advocacy and legislation, athletes secured the right to earn compensation from their names, images and likenesses through both new state laws and an NCAA policy adjustment.
The NCAA collected nearly $900 million in media rights and March Madness revenues during the 2024 fiscal year, marking basketball as the association’s largest financial contributor.
| Year | Basketball team’s expenditures | % from grand total sport team expenditures |
|---|---|---|
| 2020 | $194,429 | 24.8% |
| 2021 | $191,311 | 22.4% |
| 2022 | $196,105 | 24.6% |
| 2023 | $198,032 | 23.4% |
| 2024 | $211,101 | 23.3% |
Information for this article comes from the U.S. Department of Education. Source data is available here.
