Bring on that Big Ten cash.
UCLA’s approaching revenue stream can’t arrive fast enough after the school’s athletic department posted a deficit of $36.6 million for the 2023 fiscal year, the fifth consecutive year that the Bruins have run a shortfall stretching into 10 figures.
The debt figures have gone from $18.9 million in 2019 to $21.7 million in 2020 to $62.5 million in 2021 to $28 million in 2022, reflecting sustained financial struggles before, during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. Before the recent run of red, UCLA’s athletic department had not experienced a budget shortfall since being $164,000 in the hole in 2004.