BIG EAST AGREES TO PLAN FOR LIMITED REVENUE SHARING

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, February 4, 1992                   TAG: 9202040089
SECTION: SPORTS                    PAGE: B8   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: SCOTT BLANCHARD SPORTSWRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium
BIG EAST AGREES TO PLAN FOR LIMITED REVENUE SHARING
Big East Football Conference schools have agreed to limited revenue sharing for the next two years, accepting a proposal Miami athletic director Dave Maggard said he made to stop the "whining" about whether and when the Hurricanes would begin splitting football money.
The deal isn't a moneymaker for the league's eight schools. Virginia Tech athletic director Dave Braine said that league meetings last week in Miami produced a plan that will "take care of the cost of running the conference." Each school helps pay the league's administrative costs.
Maggard said Monday that Miami entered the Big East in 1990 with the agreement that football revenue sharing would not be discussed until 1995. But with league round-robin play scheduled to begin in 1993, several schools felt revenue sharing should begin sooner.
"I made this proposal as a compromise position," Maggard said. "There was some complaining by two or three institutions about revenue sharing. [I made the proposal] wanting to be a team player, and indicating Miami would do something when it was not mandated. There was really too much whining. I got tired of hearing the whining."
Maggard said he felt the complaints about revenue sharing were holding up work on other conference issues.
Maggard said Miami is not sharing in Big East basketball revenue this year and will not share fully until 1995, even though he said the basketball team's travel costs have risen substantially. That's why the school was reluctant to split football money with its seven league mates.
"I probably will not listen to many more proposals about [football] revenue sharing until 1995," Maggard said.
Maggard said bowl money and interest made from television money will be shared, beginning this year.
Braine said a committee will be formed to come up with a more comprehensive money-sharing plan to go into effect after 1993. The league committee will study "plans from every other conference in the country" before it makes a recommendation.
Temple athletic director Charlie Theokas, a member of the league's finance committee, said that by 1995 the Big East will know more about the revenue from its television network deal and from the bowl alliance. Then, he said, "we'll come up with something a lot more aggressive than we have now."
Don't look for any school to be sharing money 50-50, however.
"In fairness, those who earn it should keep most of it," Theokas said. "Not too long ago, [conference schools] put it all in a pot and divided it up [equally]. Those days are [gone]. There are too many inequities from top to bottom."

by Bhavesh Jinadra by CNB