With the specter of the financial fallout from the coronavirus pandemic looming over the collegiate landscape, tangible signs are beginning to appear of how the fiscal tightening will manifest itself.
The most stinging blow yet came Tuesday when the University of Cincinnati cut the men’s soccer program. It’s the second major college program to be cut since the start of the pandemic, as Old Dominion cut its wrestling program earlier this month.
The foreboding feeling around the college sports industry is that the cuts have just begun. One athletic director summed up the financial options for schools as ranging “from a haircut to decapitation” amid an environment where athletic department pay cuts and furloughs have become common.