VT's recent decision to move the 2004 LSU road game out to 2007 and replace it with a seventh home game in 2004 angered a lot of Hokie fans, and one of the statements by VT Athletic Director Jim Weaver that really stood out, at least to me, was the statement that VT "needed" that seventh home game to meet the 2004-05 budget.

Mr. Weaver addressed the LSU situation extensively on the Hokie Hotline this past Monday night, and Wayne Clevenger recapped his comments in his Hokie Hotline notes of Monday, October 13th. As noted by Wayne, "[Weaver] said that VT needs those seven home games in 2004 in order to operate in the black for that year�s budget." That statement, which Mr. Weaver also made on a previous Hokie Hotline show, is the focus of this article.

First of all, the background on the LSU thing. Here it is, in a nutshell:

• In 2001, VT agreed to the home (2002) and away (2004) series with LSU in part because the Hokies were given an assurance by ESPN in July of 2001 that the Hokies could host ECU in the Black Coaches Association (BCA) Classic game in 2004, giving the Hokies a seventh home game for 2004. VT's share of the BCA game would be about $1 million. (Weaver stated to the Raleigh News-Observer that VT had "budgeted $800,000 based on the BCA game," but the $1 million figure has been thrown around elsewhere. Since it's an easier number to deal with, we'll use the $1 million figure for the remainder of this article.)

• In the spring of 2003, BCA officials began to renege on the promise made by ESPN, leaving Tech without $1 million that they were planning on in 2004.

• To try to save the BCA game, the Hokies, according to Weaver, offered to travel to Notre Dame, Michigan, Ohio State or Penn State. VT would have gotten the same $1 million from the BCA, though travel expenses would have eaten into that money. For whatever reason, the BCA wouldn't arrange those games (or perhaps the listed teams wouldn't agree to play VT).

• Sensing that the BCA game was falling apart and not going to happen, Weaver found himself $1 million short on his 2004 budget. He decided to ask LSU to move the road game out to 2007, so he could replace the 2004 occurrence with a home game, to make up the revenue shortfall left from the disappearance of the BCA game. LSU agreed, and the Hokies now have to shop for an opponent for a home game next season (and they're facing competition from LSU, who is trying to do the same thing).

And that's where we stand (all of those details and more can be found in the Roanoke Times article AD blames BCA for LSU delay, 10/14/03) . But as I mentioned above, throughout this process, the statement that stood out to me is that VT "needed" the revenue from a seventh home game to meet the 2004-05 budget.

In the latest Hokie Hotline Notes, it is stated, "Weaver threw out some numbers basically outlining that VT pockets about $1,000,000 more in revenue for the home game versus the away game."

That tidies things up considerably. Basically, VT is losing about $1 million in a budgeted BCA payout, but can make that up by playing a home game in 2004, instead of traveling to LSU.

VT has run athletics in the black for years now, and that was before the south end zone expansion of Lane Stadium added millions to VT's revenue column. Granted, $1 million isn't chump change, but given reports in the last few years of VT athletics' financial health, is it correct to say that the seventh home game is "needed"?

It depends upon what you mean by "needed," and thanks to VT's refusal of media access to TSL, I can't call up Weaver -- or anyone else in the VT athletic department -- and ask him to clarify things. But I can throw some numbers out for you to consider.

First of all, I've read a number of things in the recent past that indicate that VT athletics has been running in the black for years, and a Roanoke Times article from a few days ago confirmed this. The following table was contained in the print edition of the RT and though it made it into the online version, the formatting was horrible, so I'll reproduce it here:

That table clearly shows that in the last six years (including the projections for this year), the Hokies have run a whopping total of $22.5 million in the black.

And they "need" a seventh home game in 2004 to balance the budget? That doesn't make sense, so I knew I was missing something, but I also knew I couldn't get the answer from VT. My best hope for some clarification was Mark Berman, who wrote the article in the RT.

So I called Berman up, and the first thing I asked him was what happens to all that extra money that Hokies are making each year. "Some of it goes into capital projects," he told me, "and some of it goes into the bank, as reserve money."

Ah, the famous cash reserve money. One interesting nugget that came out of ACC expansion, and that was reported by Berman in a July 23rd article (ACC to cost Tech, but not that much, Roanoke Times, 7/23/03), is that the Hokies are currently sitting on $5.5 million in cash reserves.

And the comment about capital projects answered a question, too. Namely, that at least some of the money Tech spends on facilities is not an "expense" line item, but rather, something that is spent after all the income and expenses are totaled up, and cash is left over.

Granted, the lines get blurred there, too. I believe that debt service on large capital projects like Lane Stadium expansion is indeed an expense line item, but one-time, non-financed expenditures, like Tech's $1 million football practice field, $1.3 million Worsham Field, and soccer and softball stadia, are capital expenditures that are paid for after all the income and expenses are figured.

"For example," Berman said, flipping through his notes, "of the $5.7 million profit last year, $2.7 went to capital projects, and $3 million went into [cash] reserves. And of the projected $7.3 million profit this year, over $5.3 million will go to capital projects, and over $1.9 million will go to reserves."

Ah, so that $7.3 million profit picture isn't so rosy, because VT immediately turns around and plows almost all of it into capital projects. But Berman's numbers also mean that the current $5.5 million cash reserve will swell to $7.4 million after this year.

Cue Lee Corso: Not so fast, my friend. Berman also reported in his July 23rd article that VT's $1 million Big East exit fee and $2 million ACC entrance fee will be paid from the cash reserves, so when the dust settles, the Hokies' cash reserve will actually go down at the conclusion of the 2003-04 academic year, to $4.4 million.

And in the latest news, reported by Berman on Wednesday, the Hokies owe about $230,000 to the Big East for Tech's part of the legal fees resulting from suing the ACC last summer. Berman states, "The athletic department will dip into its cash reserves to pay the $229,657 legal bill."

So knock the cash reserve down to about $4.17 million.

That's an interesting number-crunching exercise, but what is really under discussion is whether or not VT "needs" a seventh home game to replace the $1 million they were expecting from the 2004 BCA Classic. If you look at the surplus the Hokie athletic department has been running for the last six years, including just the last two, it's hard to make the case that VT needs the money, especially if the Hokies are going to continue to try to sock away $1-$3 million annually in their cash reserve.

It doesn't appear that losing that $1 million in revenue would cause VT athletics to run in the red in 2004, any more than it would have caused it to last year or this year. What's more likely is that Jim Weaver made up a budget for 2004-05 that included a certain amount of profit, of which X percent is going to be used on capital projects, and the remainder is going into cash reserves. If recent history is any indicator, the amount designated for cash reserves is more than the $1 million lost.

Rather than eat the $1 million, either by putting less into the cash reserves in 2004-05 or by actually taking the needed $1 million out of cash reserves for the 2004-05 budget, my interpretation is that Jim Weaver chose to brave the PR firestorm by moving the LSU road game out to 2007 and replacing it with another home game, most likely against an opponent that won't whet Hokie fans appetites for quality competition, to put it nicely.

That's Weaver's call, and again, I'm going on some unverified assumptions here, mainly that VT's financial picture will look in 2004-05 like it looked in 2002-03 and 2003-04, i.e., very good. I can't verify my assumptions about the 2004-05 budget, because Jim Weaver won't take my calls and answer any questions I might have.

The question remains: does VT "need" the $1 million from a seventh home game to run in the black -- recent history would indicate not -- or does it need the money to "meet a budget" that already included a profit destined for the cash reserve? -- recent history would indicate yes on this point. That's the question I would like to have answered.

This is an important question, because very few Hokie fans are satisfied with the delay of the LSU game to 2007, and they're questioning what grounds that decision was based on, and whether or not it was totally necessary � and whether or not they would have made the same decision, had they been in Jim Weaver's position.

Had I been in Weaver's position, I probably would have cursed the BCA under my breath and taken the $1 million hit to give the VT fans and LSU people what they really want: the 2004 road game in Baton Rouge. But Jim Weaver and I are different people, and he made a different decision, one that not only exposed him to criticism, but that saddled him with the arduous task of finding a team to fill that desired 2004 home date.

As an aside, I'll admit that the loss of a challenging road game at LSU is disappointing, but ironically, Tech fans are fussing about something that benefits them: a seventh home game in 2004, the third year in a row that the Hokies will have at least seven home games. That game's not likely to be a very challenging or interesting one, but it is a chance to visit the 'Burg one extra time and tailgate with friends next year.

Still � lots of unanswered questions, from where I sit, and another big one is this: At what point are the financial concerns satisfied, to the point where VT is willing to finish out a home-and-home series with a quality opponent, instead of cramming in another revenue-generating out of conference home game amounting to little more than a scrimmage?

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