Just yesterday, Marshall University announced that it would cut its women’s swimming and diving program and add a women’s stunt program. When the announcement was made last week, SwimSwam submitted a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to obtain the Fiscal Year 2025 Financial report.
According to the report, Marshall Athletics operated in a $924,568 loss on fiscal year 2025, which ran from July 1, 2024 through June 30, 2025.
When broken down sport by sport, all of Marshall’s sports operated in a deficit. Football led the way with $13.6 million in expenses but only $5.9 million in revenues, resulting in a $7.8 million deficit. Marshall was 10-3 overall in the 2024 season, which was during fiscal year 2025. The team fell to 5-7 overall in 2025, which will be the season incorporated in the current (2026) fiscal year.
Baseball ($2.7 million), men’s basketball ($2.5 million), and men’s soccer ($2.5 million) all ran the next three largest deficits. Women’s basketball was the lone women’s program in a $2.5 million deficit. Women’s swimming and diving ran in a $1.1 million deficit, which sits at #10 out of 14 teams total, meaning the team had the 5th smallest deficit.
It is important to point out that revenues and expenses not related to specific teams resulted in a $25.7 million surplus. Almost half of the $38.6 million in revenues not related to specific teams comes from “Direct Institutional Support” as $14.9 million in revenue was recorded that way. Student fees accounted for $6.5 million in revenue not related to specific teams, and all students pay $809.00 per semester in fees.
Sport By Sport Deficit Breakdown
* Sorted by largest to smallest deficit in the right column
| Total Operating Revenues 2025 | Total Operating Expenses 2025 | Surplus/Deficit | |
| Football | 5,793,385 | 13,574,650 | -7,781,265 |
| Baseball | 1,724,883 | 4,440,000 | -2,715,117 |
| Men’s Basketball | 1,046,548 | 3,593,971 | -2,547,423 |
| Men’s Soccer | 482,967 | 3,007,966 | -2,524,999 |
| Women’s Basketball | 180,592 | 2,679,494 | -2,498,902 |
| Women’s Soccer | 46,137 | 1,538,676 | -1,492,539 |
| Softball | 176,165 | 1,517,323 | -1,341,158 |
| Women’s Track & Field/Cross Country | 3,444 | 1,192,772 | -1,189,328 |
| Men’s Track & Field/Cross Country | 19,024 | 1,166,262 | -1,147,238 |
| Women’s Swimming and Diving | 26,555 | 1,137,682 | -1,111,127 |
| Women’s Volleyball | 85,029 | 1,112,868 | -1,027,839 |
| Women’s Tennis | 66,886 | 656,751 | -589,865 |
| Women’s Golf | 17,865 | 504,860 | -486,995 |
| Men’s Golf | 181,515 | 599,286 | -417,771 |
| Others | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Not Related To Specific Teams | 38,584,541 | 12,907,543 | 25,676,998 |
| Sum | 48,435,536 | 49,360,104 |
Marshall’s Full FY2025 Financial Report
Last Five Years Surplus/Deficit
Marshall has been in a deficit four out of the last five years, with its lone surplus coming in 2021 when it operated in a $27,979 surplus. Fiscal Year 2023 was its largest deficit with a $4.3 million deficit.
What does the program cost without the cost of the pool?
Impeccable journalism! Thank you swim swam!!
How does a women’s only swim team spend $1,137,682? That is a crazy high number! Instead of cancelling the program, maybe they should just try and not spend over 1 million dollars.
Their facility looks to be older. Probably a lot of quick repairs/bandaids to keep it running. That can escalate costs quick,
But that’s not truly a swim team cost because it’s not like they will close the pool after cutting the swim team. It will still be there for the student body to utilize, and will thus still incur maintenance costs.
Student body doesn’t use it, they have a separate pool. Only 4 high schools and 1 club use it. They will close it the second something big breaks. That way they can redo the entire basketball arena area without having to include the pool.
Wow- that rec pool looks like it has two lanes. What a waste.
They are 100% going to shut down that pool as soon as they can.
This is actually the lowest amount that I have seen from a women’s program so far…and I have data from over 20 schools.
I have a hypothesis that I am working on that women’s only programs actually cost more than combined programs (divided by two) because of the fixed costs of having a program vs the variable cost of adding one more (a men’s program usually)/adding athletes. Unsure what the data will end up saying but
They have to be factoring in the scholarship dollars…..right?
Sigh, if anyone watched the UGA Marshall game last year you can see that even with the deficit they aren’t doing much
I’ve never heard of a college or university cancelling football in favor of swimming. Yet it makes dollars and sense. Since football has a deficit, they can’t say that it brings in more money than swimming. If they subsided swimming and supported swimming more, it might bring in $$$.
I wonder how cancellation of Marshall’s women’s swimming will affect their Title 9 compliance.
They’re supposedly picking up a stunt team with roster size of 65 (there’s not a program in the country that large) to save compliance…but already have a cheer team AND have been out of compliance for over 10 years
“Marshall has a cheer program that has historically not been properly funded. Athletes have worn the same uniforms for years. Coaching turnover has happened repeatedly, without long-term investment in experienced leadership for a program that has the potential to thrive.” – part of a Facebook comment from a UM former cheerleader
If this is true, there’s no way the university is going to properly support a STUNT program.
How are these revenues and costs determined? What are direct cost that will be savings and how much of the cost are overhead and other ‘allocations” that will still be incurred but simply alllocated somewhere else.
“ Football led the way with $13.6 million in expenses but only $5.9 million in revenues, resulting in a $7.8 million deficit.”
Now I’ve never said I was a cunning business person BUT, if I ran a business and a single department is responsible for 7.8 Million of a deficit, I’m starting off my analysis and business decisions on that mess first!
Amen! And constant brain injuries aren’t conducive to a STUDENT-athlete experience…