12 ForOregonState.org/Stater Vo i c e s ALTEZA FILMS IN THE ACCIDENTAL LIMELIGHT PRESIDENT JAYATHI MURTHY ON THE CHANGING FACE OF COLLEGE ATHLETICS AND ITS IMPACT ON OSU. As told to Scholle McFarland Why should alumni care about the departure of most of our peer universities from the Pac 12 even if they don’t care about sports? This is the neighborhood we’ve been connected to for 108 years. Up and down the West Coast, we share a culture and a geography and a way of life. My first visit to Corvallis was as a part of the Pac-12 Engineering Deans. It had nothing to do with athletics and everything to do with academics — with community and an exchange of ideas within the Pac-12. This identity matters. Could you talk about the impact of not being in a Power Five conference? You’ve said revenue could decline as much as 44%, or about $41 million. One big difference between a Power Five and, say, a Group of Five conference is media rights payments. The other big factor is, of course, the viewership. When we play the competition in the Pac-12, we get seen. If you go to Seattle or LA or the Bay Area, our teams have visibility. That said, the future of college athletics is wide open. This extraordinary concentration of resources among fewer and fewer schools threatens the entire enterprise. If all you’re going to do is look at viewership and football, then you don’t have community, you don’t have academics, you don’t have the holistic development of students. And if those drop away, this simply becomes minor league professional athletics, as opposed to actual student-athletes. At that point, you have to ask what the role of a university is in this anyway. If we do lose that much money, how will that be felt? What I worry most about is student- athletes and the commitment to scholarships for them. I mean, they chose to come here and we guaranteed them support, and we have to be able to deliver.These folks are depending on us to see them through college, and we can’t just blow up their lives. The other big concern is being able to compete at the highest levels of play, which means having coaches who are talented, nationally relevant and who can coach our students to greater success. Of course, there’s also facilities, student mental health services, academic services. That’s the reason that we’re looking to the Oregon Legislature for help and looking at our own budgets internally. We’re trying to see if there are ways for us to shore up the enterprise while we look for solutions. Visibility might be something people aren’t thinking about if they don’t watch football. How do you see that part of the puzzle? ↑ President Murthy watches the Beavs win against UCLA during Homecoming weekend. Follow her on X (formerly known as Twitter) at @OregonStatePres.
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