Rutgers athletics hits record $78 million deficit. New AD says ‘It’s got to get better.’

Keli Zinn was hired as the Rutgers University athletics director on July 30, about a month after the school’s fiscal year ended. She understood going into the job that Rutgers’ financial struggles have been intensely scrutinized for decades.

After taking over, Zinn quickly dug in and studied the school’s athletics ledger herself.

Her initial impression?

“Regardless how we slice this thing, it’s got to get better,” Zinn said.

That sentiment remains true, with Rutgers’ latest athletics financial report showing its deficit topped $70 million for the third time in five years in 2024-25 after the state university spent a record $193.8 million, documents show.

NJ Advance Media obtained Rutgers’ latest fiscal year report, which covers the 2024-25 academic year, through an Open Public Records Act request.

The report shows $146.6 million in total operating revenues, thanks to a record $61.3 million from the Big Ten for its media rights and $10.7 million from the conference as its share of the league’s Football Bowl revenue fund.

Those gains were offset by an 8.7% increase in Rutgers’ sports spending from the previous year. The highest expenditures included $46.1 million in coaching salaries, $31 million in support staff and administrator salaries, $23.1 million in scholarship aid, $14.4 million in facilities debt, $13.5 million in team travel and $8.4 million in student-athlete meals.

The ledger shows a $47.2 million shortfall. When added to the $7 million subsidized from the school’s general budget, $8 million from the state budget and $15.8 million in student fees, the department’s deficit reached a record $78 million.

It brings Rutgers’ athletics deficit to $516.9 million since joining the Big Ten in 2014-15.

Rutgers’ expenditures have increased nearly 175% over its first 11 years in the Big Ten, a review of the school’s annual financial reports shows.

Rutgers’ $193,831,838 total expenditures was 3.7% of the university’s $5.28 billion budget in 2024-25, documents show.

“You could make the argument that we do not have an expense problem,” Zinn said. ”But we do in fact have a revenue problem and a pretty significant one."

Zinn has spent her first six months as athletic director trying to improve Rutgers’ fortunes on the playing surfaces, most notably by increasing the school’s funding for Name, Image and Likeness opportunities to entice and retain top tier athletes.

However, Rutgers’ latest financial report doesn’t include a $20.5 million NIL expenditure that the athletics department will be on the hook for during the current 2025-26 campaign.

“Obviously our expenses have exceeded and outpaced our revenue and in some cases year over year to a pretty significant degree,” Zinn said. “That’s a piece that we will spend quite a bit of time on, understanding that the current fiscal year that we sit in there was a $20.5 million expense with the revenue sharing (for athletes) and the additional scholarship support.”

Because of those additions, Zinn expects 2025-26 spending to exceed $200 million.

“I think what you’ll see a year from now is that’s going to be our worst year looking at a profit and loss scenario,” Zinn said. “But you’ll see some level of improvement that’s expected in that ‘26-‘27 year and then by ’27-’28, based upon the current projections we have, in some growth categories and opportunities with revenue, I’m hopeful you’ll actually see (the deficit) start to decline.”

In a wide-ranging interview, Zinn told NJ Advance Media she was taken aback by the department’s recent struggles in some key revenue areas.

For instance, football ticket sales were flat from the 2023 to 2024 seasons, slightly decreasing to $9.248 million from $9.242 million.

“The reason it jumped out to me surrounded the performance to the team,” Zinn said. ”When you look at it, coming off of two winning seasons, to not see an uptick in that category indicated that we needed to take a closer look at it. What I am pleased to share is we actually did see growth in that category with an additional $1.3 million in single ticket sales here for the past season."

Rutgers football spent a record amount in 2024-25, totaling $76 million after a $64.4 million tally the year prior. Key expenditures included $17 million in coaching salaries, $11.1 million in support-staff salaries, $4.5 million in student-athlete meals and a $2 million recruiting budget.

“It’s high based upon what you’re seeing us pulling in from a revenue standpoint with football,” Zinn said.

However, Zinn added that the salary totals on the NCAA fiscal year report don’t reflect the actual salaries paid to employees because fringe benefits are factored into the totals. Fringe rate is the percentage added to an employee’s base salary representing health care and retirement benefits, and payroll taxes. Rutgers’ fringe rate — 72.9% in FY2025 — is dictated by the state of New Jersey and is believed to be the highest of any Big Ten school.

“When you run the numbers, it’s millions year over year that then adds to an expense for us, which to a certain degree is uncontrollable,” Zinn said.

A bigger area of concern, she said, was a nearly $6 million decline in the column that combines royalties, licensing, advertisement and sponsorship sales.

“I think you’ll see a good level of growth in that category in the years ahead‚" Zinn said. “That’s a combination of inventory we already have available to sell that has not been sold. And then certainly when you layer that in with some brand and marketing strategy that’s attractive to corporations and companies, all that comes together to create a much better picture there.”

Last week, the NCAA approved a proposal that will permit Division I sports programs to place additional commercial logos or patches on uniforms beginning next season.

“We’re already having good conversations with some folks about that alone,” Zinn said.

Her biggest focus includes boosting the Scarlet Knights’ fundraising efforts in the years ahead. Rutgers’ contributions decreased in 2024-25, going from $8.5 million to $8.1 million. That pales in comparison to Rutgers’ competition, with Big Ten schools averaging $39.2 million in contributions in FY2024, an NJ Advance Media analysis showed.

Zinn said her priorities from a facilities standpoint would be to study ways to build club level and premium seating options for both SHI Stadium and Jersey Mike’s Arena.

“I understand why it wasn’t done in the past — it’s expensive to put forth brick and mortar," Zinn said. ”But you have to wonder a little bit looking at the past 10 years, for example, if that existed and you had the opportunity to bring on a multi-million dollar revenue stream year over year, you would start to find yourself in a place where you pick up a category of revenue growth that exceeds your expenses. The absence of that infrastructure has certainly been an issue for us historically and it will continue to be an issue for us if we don’t address that."

Read the original article on NJ.com. Add NJ.com as a Preferred Source by clicking here.