UH will raise the bar on its student-athlete stipends

Officially, the checks that college scholarship athletes now receive for expenses beyond the traditional tuition, books, room and board are known as “cost of attendance” stipends.

But, in reality, they might better be called the “cost of trying to remain competitive.”

At the University of Hawaii, where the chase to keep up with its peers escalates, those costs are going up.

For the school year that begins in August, UH says it will hike the funding of COA to its nearly 250 fully scholarshiped athletes by 62 percent this year.

That means a payout of $1,000 to $2,000 per athlete, depending on the sport. For example, women’s and men’s basketball players will get $2,000 each, while golfers stand to receive $1,000 (men) to $1,789 (women). Football is pegged at $1,500 for each of the 85 players.

Overall, it can be as much as a $1,000 per player increase at UH from 2015-16, when the NCAA first allowed its members to begin paying the stipends.

And while it is a lot of money for UH, which has knocked on doors and looked under sofa cushions, it remains in the shadow of much of its Division I brethren.

The money is designed to go for out-of-pocket expenses such as home travel, phone costs, clothes, etc., to more adequately address the actual costs of attending college that family resources might not be able to meet.

Overall, UH said it spent $256,100 on COA stipends last year, a lot for a school struggling with its budget, yet a fraction of many schools in the Mountain West, where it competes in football. Boise State, which offered as much as $5,100 per athlete, invested more than $1.1 million, and Utah State anted up $783,432.

Nevada was the lone applicable member in the 12-school MWC not to offer COA, but has vowed to fully participate this year.

In the nine-member Big West, where most of UH’s teams compete, Hawaii had the highest across-the-board COA in 2015-16 at an average of just over $1,000 per athlete.

Under NCAA rules and school calculations, UH could have paid as much a $3,925 per athlete last year, if it had the resources.

But not to offer some form of COA is to risk falling dangerously behind in recruiting. For example, if two schools are close in other aspects, how often is the recruit likely to pick the one that pays peanuts over another that pays a tidy sum? Especially, when the difference over a four-year career is in the thousands of dollars?

But while many schools have underwritten their COA programs with generous state and institutional funds or simply raised ticket prices and instituted surcharges, UH has increasingly looked to fundraising and donations.

“Our COA initiative is an opportunity to support student-athlete welfare while keeping our teams competitive,” athletic director David Matlin said. “Running a Division I program in Hawaii has unique costs due to our geography and we feel COA is an important initiative. We are very appreciative to the donors who have stepped up to support our student-athletes.”

Nearly 35 percent of the stipends UH pays out this year is listed as coming from fundraising and donations. That includes money raised by coaches for their sports and multi-year pledges by some former Board of Regents members.

Coaches were tasked to solicit funds if they wanted to be in a position to offer more than the $1,000 provided last year. These days that is a challenge that is hard to walk away from.

Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@staradvertiser.com or 529-4820.