The best estimate of football recruiting expenditures right now comes from the US Department of Education’s website on Post-secondary Education.   At that site, recruiting expenses for student athletes are reported by gender – men’s and women’s recruiting.  Since the individual football recruiting expenses have not been reported for the past 7 years, most analysts are now using the men’s recruiting expenses as a proxy for football expenses. This is appropriate since football accounts for the lion share of the men’s scholarships and recruiting expenses at D-1A schools.  In the table below, I’ve compiled the men’s recruiting expenses for the past 3 recruiting classes for the Pac-12 conference.

Table 1.  Men’s recruiting expenses in the Pac-12 conference.

Table 1 reveals that the overall recruiting expenses have been increasing at an accelerated rate over the past three years.  OSU’s expenses rank among the lowest in each of the years and is ranked 11^th in the conference when averaged over the period.  Despite increasing expenditures by over $156,000 from 2010 to 2012, OSU failed to substantively raise its ranking in relation to conference peers because of the increases in recruiting expenses by rival schools.  OSU spends only 80% of the conference average on recruiting despite being located in an area where travel expenses are greater than for metropolitan locales and in a region and program that requires more selling of the opportunity.

OSU’s conference rival UO has ranked 1st in Pac-12 recruiting expenditures for the past three years. UO spends $258,430 more than the Pac-12 average on recruiting, and $390,606 more than OSU.  Second place in expenditures Stanford has an agreeable climate, an academic reputation that sells itself, excellent facilities, and close proximity to airports and other means of transportation, but the Cardinal program is still willing to spend more money on marketing its program to potential student-athletes.  It’s no coincidence that these programs are at the top of the standings on the football field too.

So what has these recruiting expenditures brought to these programs?  Table 2 shows the final national recruiting class rankings of the Pac-12 programs according to Rivals for the past three classes as well as the overall mean.  USC is clearly on top and having tradition, location and many other desirables makes spending more to market their program and on recruiting travel not a necessity.  USC recruits well on a slightly higher than the conference average budget.  UO spends much more on recruiting to overcome not having many of the advantages that USC possesses and has worked their way into 2^nd place in recruiting in the conference.  Cal and Stanford are programs that are moving in opposite directions in recruiting.  Cal reduced expenditures and lost ground in recruiting while Stanford increased spending and gained ground.

OSU having none of these built-in advantages continues to underspend the conference average on recruiting and as a result, continues to rank below the conference average in recruiting.  If OSU and its fans want football recruiting classes ranked in the top half of the Pac-12, then the program needs to make plans to boost recruiting expenses into the top half of the conference.

Table 2.  National recruiting class rankings for the Pac-12 conference.