Small Change

Something was amiss. Basketball teams from Duke and Michigan were running up and down the floor of stately Cameron Indoor Stadium on the second Saturday night in December, against the backdrop of varnished wood and brass railings that make the building seem as much like an old library as a gymnasium. Everything was in its place. Yet Cameron didn't seem quite so...well, stately. What was it?

The banner. That was it. Customarily the courtside tables sport a deep regal-blue facing unsullied by messages. Elegant, almost. But instead there was a long white sign, unfurled over the entire 94 feet of the north side of the court: HALL OF FAME BOWL TICKETS CALL 1-800-672-BLUE. Forget dignity. The Dukies might as well have advertised nickel drafts or 99-cent burgers.

But of course. No list of college football bowl traditions—the parades, the pageantry, the colorful names spiced with fruits, flowers, garden tools and car-rental companies—would be complete these days without the ticket pitch. That's because many bowl games invite schools in much the same way Don Corleone invited wedding guests into his office. He does you a favor. You do him a favor.

Duke, justifiably eager to seize the fruits of an 8-3 season (and a $1 million payoff), will play Wisconsin in the Jan. 2 Hall of Fame Bowl in Tampa. As part of its agreement with the bowl, Duke must buy—and then try to sell—11,250 tickets at $30 each. Having already sent a letter offering tickets for sale to each of its 102,000 alumni, Duke decided to broaden its marketing by hanging the banner. "This was a one-time opportunity on national television," said an athletic department official. Anyhow, it looks as if the Blue Devils will make it to their goal. Wisconsin, a much larger school that agreed to sell at least 23,000 seats, will sell them all. Maybe the Badgers used a bigger banner?

Bowl tradition? You bet, but it's of the nouveau variety. As in money. Consider the fact that next season two teams will get paid in excess of $12 million each for knocking helmets together in the Fiesta Bowl. That's a tradition athletic directors can't wait to embrace. But first things first. Herewith our guide to bowl realities:

1) Schools don't get rich by playing in bowls . Never mind the payout numbers you read. The catch is that if the Tulip Bowl is paying State U $1 million to play in its game and live in Tuliptown for a week, it expects State U to use that money to cover its expenses. Travel, lodging, food, tulips for loved ones—everything.

Also, most major conferences share a large portion of the revenue earned by member schools from bowl games. Example: Tennessee went to the 1993 Hall of Fame Bowl, which paid $850,000 per team. So, after the other 11 members of the SEC took their cut, the Vols ended up with $566,020. They spent $572,293. That's a loss of $6,273.

Bowls with big guarantees (Rose, $6.5 million; Sugar, $4.45 million; Orange, $4.3 million; Fiesta and Cotton, $3 million each) are more profitable for the participating schools. But the net gain is considerably smaller than the guarantee. SEC member Florida received $4.1 million for playing in the 1994 Sugar Bowl. After conference revenue sharing and expenses, the Gators wound up with just under $525,000 (chart, below). Texas A&M got $3 million from last year's Cotton Bowl and cleared a mere $225,000 after expenses.

The Aloha Bowl, which pays the NCAA bowl minimum of $750,000 per team and takes place on a costly, exotic island far from the mainland, has retired the red-ink trophy. Kansas played in Honolulu in 1992 and dropped $31,500 (chart, page 59). Alabama lost money on its Aloha appearance in '85. This year, Aloha invitee Kansas State (which plays Boston College) is paring its overhead by leaving its band at home.

2) Check that. Notre Dame and Miami make big money . Major bowls, no revenue sharing: the path to financial security. No, this isn't a late-night cable TV, no-money-down, fast-cash real estate seminar. It's the Fighting Irish Way, and for another year, the Hurricane Way. (The Big East, which Miami joined in 1991, begins bowl revenue sharing next year.) Notre Dame—the Irish may be 6-4-1, but without their cooperation and juice there would be neither this season's bowl coalition (which was supposed to arrange the best possible matchups in six top bowls) nor next season's three-bowl alliance, so put a sock in it—plays in the Jan. 2 Fiesta Bowl against 10-1 Colorado. Notre Dame figures to spend approximately $800,000, so it will net about $2.2 million.