Univ. of Nevada is "bucking the trend of the rest of the Mountain West and won't offer the full cost of attendance to its student-athletes" for the '15-16 season but "plans to do so" starting in '16-17, according to Chris Murray of the RENO GAZETTE-JOURNAL. Nevada AD Doug Knuth said, "For us, we're planning on the fall of 2016 to implement that. We're 100 percent supportive of doing it. We understand it and we think it's important, but for financial reasons, we won't be able to be behind it 100 percent from day one. We'll have to phase it in." Murray notes seven of the 12 Mountain West schools "have committed to paying the full cost of attendance." UNLV and Hawaii "haven't decided if they will." New Mexico "will fund the cost of attendance, but hasn't set a timeline for when the payments will begin," and Air Force is a non-scholarship school. Nevada estimates its full cost of attendance "at $4,800 per scholarship" and $1.046M per year, which is 4.2% of its $23M athletic budget (RENO GAZETTE-JOURNAL, 5/15).
DOLLARS AND SENSE: ESPN.com's Andrea Adelson noted Boston College AD Brad Bates "predicted exactly what has played out over the last several months and during conversations at the ACC spring meetings, as coaches have openly wondered how the inherent inequities will affect recruiting and athletic directors have wondered how they are going to pay for it all." There is "no proof just yet that prospective student-athletes are making choices based on how much money they can get in cost of attendance from each school." However, cost of attendance "cannot be looked at in a vacuum, either." The natural reaction is to "look at the individual dollar amounts offered and immediately jump to conclusions." Every coach and AD is "worried about being at a competitive disadvantage," but nobody "knows whether that is actually the case." Still, there is the "very real fear that athletic departments will begin to meddle in financial aid offices to try and raise their cost-of-attendance figures." Virginia AD Craig Littlepage said, "I would like to think that kids are making decisions not strictly on the basis of financials" (ESPN.com, 5/14).
