This is going to be a long post, but this is stemming from discussions I’ve read, or participated in around Wyoming athletics being the “front porch" of the University. I’ve shared this in other threads, but I am a Wyoming Grad (Master's, 2016), and am currently working at a large college in the southeast while also finishing my doctoral degree in Higher Education Leadership. I aspire to be a senior administrator one day, so this nerdy shit is right up my alley. If you’re not interested in data, facts, or otherwise, probably just skip this post. I don't mean to sound like a jerk, I just wanted to ground this in the factual data that I could pull.
With all the NIL articles lately, the 3-million dollar ask from State coffers, and the Tom Burman op-ed that came out a few weeks ago, I wanted to dig into the actual numbers. This post is only going to address being the “front porch” for the University, insofar as it brings awareness to the college in a meaningful way. There is no question that athletics brings visibility to the University, but is it actually turning into more students? I am only focusing on traditional, undergraduate students. Graduate students are a different beast statistically, and are statistically irrelevant when it comes to participation in University Athletics.
I’ve been thinking a lot about the “why” behind the proposal. Candidly, I support the theory of it, but I was curious about the data. I asked Ragtime why Athletics should get that kind of priority over, say, a new library, better dorms, or the student rec center—things that make meaningful differences in the college experience. The default answer we always hear from Leadership—the one AD Tom Burman just pushed in his recent op-ed—is that Athletics is the “front porch” of the University. The idea is that the national visibility from guys like Josh Allen or a big bowl game creates this “halo effect” that drives applications and keeps the school healthy.
I’m a poke for life, but I’ve also spent my career managing institutional portfolios and looking at data. So, I decided to pull the official UW Common Data Sets from 2013 to 2024 (2025 isnt out yet) to see if that “front porch” is actually getting people to walk into the house. Honestly? The numbers don’t support it.
The “Visibility” Blanket:
To give Burman and the PR team credit, the “visibility” is working. Since the Josh Allen era started (around 2016-17), applications to UW have actually climbed to record highs. We went from about 4,300 apps a decade ago to 6,217 this past year. On paper, that looks like a massive win for the brand. People are definitely looking at the porch.
The Yield Crisis:
But here is the part nobody at the Rochelle Athletics Center wants to talk about: While more kids are applying, way fewer are actually enrolling. In 2014, our “Yield Rate” (the percentage of admitted students who actually show up) was 38.3%. Today? It has plummeted to 23.8%. Think about that for a second. Three out of every four kids who get accepted to Wyoming, as first time freshman, are now saying “No thanks” and doing something else. If athletics is supposed to be the “hook” that makes Wyoming look attractive to a kid from out of state (or even in-state), the hook probaly isn't getting any bites. We’re getting more “window shoppers” than ever, but they aren’t buying the product.
In a recent article, UW President Ed Seidel touted that applications to the school “are up,” even highlighting a “burst” of applications coming from Buffalo, New York, because of the Josh Allen connection. To be blunt, this is either intellectually dishonest or some great PR spin. While it makes for a nice headline to say people in Buffalo are hitting the “Apply” button, that metric is completely hollow without context. High-fiving over a “burst” of applications from New York is meaningless when total undergraduate enrollment has simultaneously dropped by nearly 20% since 2013. We are losing actual students on campus, while celebrating increased applications (“window shoppers”) from Buffalo, and pretending it’s a sign of institutional health.
The Enrollment Reality Check:
Despite being a “national household name” (Burman’s words, not mine) thanks to Josh Allen, and despite Women’s Basketball being a model of D1 consistency (winning 18-23 games almost every year), the actual University is shrinking. Total Undergrad Enrollment has dropped from 10,117 in 2013 to 8,130 today. We have lost nearly 2,000 students while we were busy being “honored on ESPN.”
When you do the “Moneyball” math (shoutout to that Cowboy State Daily article on Coach Wicks), that loss of 2,000 students is a catastrophe. If you estimate tuition, fees, and housing at roughly $8,000 per head, the University is missing out on $16 million a year in revenue compared to a decade ago, before you even consider inflation, cost of goods, or the cost to acquire those students.
Why State Funds are a Hard Sell:
This brings me back to Ragtime’s idea. If we ask the state to lock up $100M in an investment account to pay for NIL, or request that $3M to support Athletics, we have to prove that Athletics is solving some of the University’s problems. But the data shows the opposite. We had a “Banner Year” in 2021-22… Men’s Basketball won 25 games and made the tournament, WBB racked up another 17 wins and FB went to, and won a Bowl Game. In the admissions cycles to follow, our Yield Rate hit a then-record low of 27%. Winning games on Saturday isn’t stopping the bleed in the classrooms on Monday.
Coach Wicks is out here grinding, using algorithms to find kids willing to take “minutes over money” because our NIL war chest is empty. I love that “Cowboy Tough” mentality, but we have to be honest: if the goal is “University Health,” part of the current strategy doesn’t seem to be working, and frankly, it probably hasn't in many, many years.
I want to be clear: I am not discounting the “secondary” impacts of a D1 program. I know athletics drives tourism, hotel stays in Laramie, recreation tax dollars for the state, and charitable contributions to the University. Those are real benefits. But from where I sit in personally and professionally, I have to prioritize the things that keep the university’s doors open, and that is the student body. The simple reality is that if there are no students, there is no university left to provide those benefits to the state in the first place. At least until NIL kills the current model and these athletics programs detach from Universities altogether. Then, we can have more conversations about the value of state-supported professional sport programs. This may be intentionally obtuse, but as long as the athletic programs use "University of Wyoming," the University is first.
Conclusion:
I want the Pokes to win. I want us to stay D1 (though I do think FCS is a better fit, wonder how many of y’all will stop reading there). But we should stop using “Admissions Impact” as a shield for why we need more money for Athletics. The data is clear: Winning does not drive enrollment.
If we want the state to invest, we need to stop pretending it’s for the “good of the academic mission” and just admit we want to win because we’re proud of this state. But if I’m a legislator looking at a 20% drop in students, I’m putting that $100M into lowering tuition or building better dorms long before I’m putting it into an NIL collective.
We could build a world-class front porch. But the house is losing its roof, particularly in this post-COVID storm. We’ve got to figure out how to fix both, or the “visibility” won’t matter because there won’t be anyone left to see it.
Data - FWIW, I pulled this myself, so there may be some errors.
Sources:
UW Office of Institutional Analysis: Common Data Sets (2013-2024). [https://www.uwyo.edu/oia/cds.html]
Tom Burman Op-Ed: “What University of Wyoming Athletics Does for Our State” (Nov 2025).
Cowboy State Daily: “Pay To Play: University Of Wyoming’s Battle To Remain Division I In An NIL World” (Dec 2025).
Cowboy State Daily: “University Of Wyoming Wants Extra $3 Million From Legislature After NIL Deals” (Dec 11, 2025).
With all the NIL articles lately, the 3-million dollar ask from State coffers, and the Tom Burman op-ed that came out a few weeks ago, I wanted to dig into the actual numbers. This post is only going to address being the “front porch” for the University, insofar as it brings awareness to the college in a meaningful way. There is no question that athletics brings visibility to the University, but is it actually turning into more students? I am only focusing on traditional, undergraduate students. Graduate students are a different beast statistically, and are statistically irrelevant when it comes to participation in University Athletics.
I’ve been thinking a lot about the “why” behind the proposal. Candidly, I support the theory of it, but I was curious about the data. I asked Ragtime why Athletics should get that kind of priority over, say, a new library, better dorms, or the student rec center—things that make meaningful differences in the college experience. The default answer we always hear from Leadership—the one AD Tom Burman just pushed in his recent op-ed—is that Athletics is the “front porch” of the University. The idea is that the national visibility from guys like Josh Allen or a big bowl game creates this “halo effect” that drives applications and keeps the school healthy.
I’m a poke for life, but I’ve also spent my career managing institutional portfolios and looking at data. So, I decided to pull the official UW Common Data Sets from 2013 to 2024 (2025 isnt out yet) to see if that “front porch” is actually getting people to walk into the house. Honestly? The numbers don’t support it.
The “Visibility” Blanket:
To give Burman and the PR team credit, the “visibility” is working. Since the Josh Allen era started (around 2016-17), applications to UW have actually climbed to record highs. We went from about 4,300 apps a decade ago to 6,217 this past year. On paper, that looks like a massive win for the brand. People are definitely looking at the porch.
The Yield Crisis:
But here is the part nobody at the Rochelle Athletics Center wants to talk about: While more kids are applying, way fewer are actually enrolling. In 2014, our “Yield Rate” (the percentage of admitted students who actually show up) was 38.3%. Today? It has plummeted to 23.8%. Think about that for a second. Three out of every four kids who get accepted to Wyoming, as first time freshman, are now saying “No thanks” and doing something else. If athletics is supposed to be the “hook” that makes Wyoming look attractive to a kid from out of state (or even in-state), the hook probaly isn't getting any bites. We’re getting more “window shoppers” than ever, but they aren’t buying the product.
In a recent article, UW President Ed Seidel touted that applications to the school “are up,” even highlighting a “burst” of applications coming from Buffalo, New York, because of the Josh Allen connection. To be blunt, this is either intellectually dishonest or some great PR spin. While it makes for a nice headline to say people in Buffalo are hitting the “Apply” button, that metric is completely hollow without context. High-fiving over a “burst” of applications from New York is meaningless when total undergraduate enrollment has simultaneously dropped by nearly 20% since 2013. We are losing actual students on campus, while celebrating increased applications (“window shoppers”) from Buffalo, and pretending it’s a sign of institutional health.
The Enrollment Reality Check:
Despite being a “national household name” (Burman’s words, not mine) thanks to Josh Allen, and despite Women’s Basketball being a model of D1 consistency (winning 18-23 games almost every year), the actual University is shrinking. Total Undergrad Enrollment has dropped from 10,117 in 2013 to 8,130 today. We have lost nearly 2,000 students while we were busy being “honored on ESPN.”
When you do the “Moneyball” math (shoutout to that Cowboy State Daily article on Coach Wicks), that loss of 2,000 students is a catastrophe. If you estimate tuition, fees, and housing at roughly $8,000 per head, the University is missing out on $16 million a year in revenue compared to a decade ago, before you even consider inflation, cost of goods, or the cost to acquire those students.
Why State Funds are a Hard Sell:
This brings me back to Ragtime’s idea. If we ask the state to lock up $100M in an investment account to pay for NIL, or request that $3M to support Athletics, we have to prove that Athletics is solving some of the University’s problems. But the data shows the opposite. We had a “Banner Year” in 2021-22… Men’s Basketball won 25 games and made the tournament, WBB racked up another 17 wins and FB went to, and won a Bowl Game. In the admissions cycles to follow, our Yield Rate hit a then-record low of 27%. Winning games on Saturday isn’t stopping the bleed in the classrooms on Monday.
Coach Wicks is out here grinding, using algorithms to find kids willing to take “minutes over money” because our NIL war chest is empty. I love that “Cowboy Tough” mentality, but we have to be honest: if the goal is “University Health,” part of the current strategy doesn’t seem to be working, and frankly, it probably hasn't in many, many years.
I want to be clear: I am not discounting the “secondary” impacts of a D1 program. I know athletics drives tourism, hotel stays in Laramie, recreation tax dollars for the state, and charitable contributions to the University. Those are real benefits. But from where I sit in personally and professionally, I have to prioritize the things that keep the university’s doors open, and that is the student body. The simple reality is that if there are no students, there is no university left to provide those benefits to the state in the first place. At least until NIL kills the current model and these athletics programs detach from Universities altogether. Then, we can have more conversations about the value of state-supported professional sport programs. This may be intentionally obtuse, but as long as the athletic programs use "University of Wyoming," the University is first.
Conclusion:
I want the Pokes to win. I want us to stay D1 (though I do think FCS is a better fit, wonder how many of y’all will stop reading there). But we should stop using “Admissions Impact” as a shield for why we need more money for Athletics. The data is clear: Winning does not drive enrollment.
If we want the state to invest, we need to stop pretending it’s for the “good of the academic mission” and just admit we want to win because we’re proud of this state. But if I’m a legislator looking at a 20% drop in students, I’m putting that $100M into lowering tuition or building better dorms long before I’m putting it into an NIL collective.
We could build a world-class front porch. But the house is losing its roof, particularly in this post-COVID storm. We’ve got to figure out how to fix both, or the “visibility” won’t matter because there won’t be anyone left to see it.
Data - FWIW, I pulled this myself, so there may be some errors.
Sources:
UW Office of Institutional Analysis: Common Data Sets (2013-2024). [https://www.uwyo.edu/oia/cds.html]
Tom Burman Op-Ed: “What University of Wyoming Athletics Does for Our State” (Nov 2025).
Cowboy State Daily: “Pay To Play: University Of Wyoming’s Battle To Remain Division I In An NIL World” (Dec 2025).
Cowboy State Daily: “University Of Wyoming Wants Extra $3 Million From Legislature After NIL Deals” (Dec 11, 2025).
Last edited:
