Boston College Athletics Recruiting Expenses Lagging Behind Rest Of ACC?

A few days ago the Business of College Sports examined how much schools spend to recruit athletes. The article gathered data from the Department of Education for the 2010-11 year and compared across the ACC.

In 2010-2011, Boston College spent $563,383 towards men's athletics recruiting, the second lowest expense total in the ACC behind only Maryland, who is poor. That $563,383 total represented a $46,949 average per program (lowest in the ACC), or $1,574 per athlete (second lowest, again, ahead of Maryland).

First, a few caveats on these figures.

A link to the original data source is not included, though this figures are readily accessible using the Equity in Athletics Data Analysis Cutting Tool. The study simply takes the Recruiting Expenses line item, broken out by men's and women's teams, and divides by the total number of men's and women's varsity programs and total number of participants.

The flaws in the analysis using the above figures are two-fold -- not all of Boston College's 358 men's (and 353 women's) athletics participants and are recruited, and not every BC varsity sport offers scholarships. In both cases, the recruiting expenses are minimal when compared to expenses incurred in one of the revenue sports, say college football.

However, even if you ignore the per-program and per-athlete averages given some of the above data limitations, taking the top-line figures you can get a relative sense of just how much BC is spending in the recruitment of athletes.

Total Men's Sports Recruiting Expenses, 2010-11
$1,173,904 -- Georgia Tech
$967,282 -- Duke
$949,396 -- North Carolina
$796,648 -- Clemson
$749,499 -- Florida State
$730,358 -- Virginia
$722,995 -- North Carolina State
$650,651 -- Virginia Tech
$597,618 -- Wake Forest
$591,872 -- Miami
$563,383 -- Boston College
$538,497 -- Maryland

Total Women's Sports Recruiting Expenses, 2010-11
$407,483 -- Florida State
$387,942 -- North Carolina
$346,197 -- North Carolina State
$346,096 -- Duke
$330,416 -- Virginia Tech
$315,695 -- Georgia Tech
$315,535 -- Virginia
$305,399 -- Miami
$287,855 -- Maryland
$272,917 -- Clemson
$186,026 -- Boston College
$162,030 -- Wake Forest

BC ranked 11th in both men's and women's sports for the amount of money spent on recruiting in 2010-11. Boston College's total men's sports recruiting expense in 2010-11 was $189,292 below the conference average, while women's sports recruitment costs were $119,273 off the average.

Should BC's spending be more in line with the rest of the conference? Or should recruiting expenses be more in line with BC's peer, private schools like Duke, Miami and Wake Forest? Is Boston College athletics getting what it's paying for on the recruiting trail?

Talk amongst yourselves.

HT: From The Rumble Seat