The Texas Tech athletics budget for fiscal year 2026 recently grew by $10 million.
Red Raiders have George Strait, Joey McGuire, his Texas Tech football team, and donors to thank.
Tech’s fiscal years run from Sept. 1 through Aug. 31. The athletics department began the current fiscal year with an approved operating budget of $164,184,670. Regent Tim Culp, chair of the finance and investments committee, granted exigent circumstances approval on April 11 for the university to process an athletics budget adjustment of up to $10 million.
After the Texas Tech University System Board of Regents held its May 7 meeting in Lubbock, Culp said the adjustment would bring the budget to about $175 million for the fiscal year that ends Aug. 31.
“So we increased the revenues by $10 million and a corresponding increase in expenditures,” Culp said, “because we have to have a balanced budget, so there’ll be some additional spending as well.”
Culp and Tech deputy athletics director Jonathan Botros said the sources of the additional revenue included the two-night Strait concerts on April 24 and April 25 at Jones AT&T Stadium, revenue from Tech football’s participation in the Big 12 championship game and the College Football Playoff as well as donor contributions.
“There’s a threshold where you have to go back to the board if you adjust your budget over a certain amount of dollars,” Botros said, “and so basically it was just through some successful initiatives, like the concert and like the Big 12 championship that you don’t normally build into the budget because you don’t know whether it’s going to happen.
“We’ve got an obligation of kind of making revenues and expenses balance to be in the budget, so it got to a point where it exceeded that threshold, so we got board approval for that. Obviously, there’s expenses associated with all three of those line items, so that’s why we asked for their approval in that way.”
For comparison, in its annual revenue-and-expenses report to the NCAA, due each year in January, Tech this January reported $145.3 million in total operating revenue for fiscal year 2025 and $144.4 million in total operating expenses.
Here’s how much Texas Tech athletics projects making from George Strait concerts
Combined attendance for the Strait concerts was announced at 133,065.
In February, Tech athletics director Kirby Hocutt said he was hoping Tech athletics’ cut of revenue from the Strait concerts would be $3 million. Culp said this month the estimate approved by regents was about $4 million.
“I think it’ll end up being a little north of that [$4 million],” Botros said. “It was really successful. We had merchandise sales that were one of the most successful, if not the most successful, we believe, in George Strait history. Concessions was really, really well executed from a two-day perspective.
“The additional number of points of sale we added for the concert was substantial. Obviously, the pricing was adjusted a little bit from a football game and things like that.
“The Messina group [Messina Touring] was happy with it, we were happy with it, and it seems like the feedback from the public has been overwhelmingly positive.”
Tech hired Chase Jolesch in November 2023 as senior associate AD and chief revenue officer. Generating new revenue streams auxiliary to athletics is one of his primary responsibilities. In August 2024, Hocutt and Botros talked publicly about new revenue-generating ideas that included hosting concerts at Jones AT&T Stadium. In June 2024, a Strait concert at Kyle Field drew 110,905, and Texas A&M reported net revenue of $3.9 million from the event.
Will Texas Tech host another stadium concert in 2027? They’re looking at the possibility
Botros said Jolesch said an August/September time frame is likely for making a decision about hosting acts or multiple acts in a 2027 stadium concert.
There are multiple considerations: Whether to schedule the event when students are on campus. The weather, which was ideal for the Strait concerts. How to work around conflicts — Tech baseball hosted Oklahoma State in a three-game Big 12 series the same weekend as the concerts, moving up start times on two of the days.
And, of course, there’s the matter of what recording artists to engage — country again or a different sound?
After all, few artists have George Strait’s drawing power.
“I think it’s got to be the right fit,” Botros said. “George was pretty incredible to be our first act. There’s not a ton of acts that could garner two nights in a row, sold-out crowds, 133,000 people.
“But, again, the touring group has said, ‘Hey, please. We want to be your first call next time you guys are booking an act,’ and we’ve had others reach out and say, ‘Hey, we’ve heard nothing but success. What dates do you guys have available?'”
This article originally appeared on Lubbock Avalanche-Journal: Texas Tech budget grows by $10M with George Strait partly to thank
Reporting by Don Williams, Lubbock Avalanche-Journal / Lubbock Avalanche-Journal
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
