MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Georgia Southern is guaranteed $850,000 for Saturday’s season opener, West Virginia’s largest-ever payout to an opponent and nearly half of what the school makes a from a typical home game.

Blame the escalating cost of so-called “guarantee games,” in which Power 5 schools bring in mid-majors and FCS programs as nonconference tuneups. It didn’t help that West Virginia only finalized this game 16 months ago, by which time it was desperate to fill the hole in its 2015 schedule.

“It gets expensive,” said Alex Hammond, WVU’s associate athletics director for football operations, during a Thursday night appearance on Dana Holgorsen’s radio show.

West Virginia reached out to numerous schools—“we were aggressively looking,” Hammond said—before striking a deal with Georgia Southern, which at the time was climbing into the FBS.

The $850,000 represents $300,000 more than the Mountaineers paid another Sun Belt Conference member, Georgia State, for their visit in 2013. (Lest you think West Virginia is getting hosed on this deal, note that Georgia Southern also is commanding $850,000 for November’s game at Georgia.)

Based on a Freedom of Information Act request to WVU and other Big 12 schools, Saturday marks the ninth-highest payout by any current league member since 2010. (See chart at right.)

For West Virginia, it tops the previous high-dollar mark of $775,000 paid to Bowling Green in 2011.

Lest you think West Virginia is getting hosed on this deal, note that Georgia Southern also is commanding $850,000 for November’s game at Georgia. And the Eagles negotiated $750,000 for their 2014 game at N.C. State.



The Mountaineers typically make about $2 million per home game at 60,000-seat Milan Puskar Stadium. Schools with larger budgets and more expansive stadiums, such as Oklahoma (82,112 capacity) and Texas (100,119), can afford to pay larger sums to beat up on smaller schools. The smaller schools know this and use it as leverage.

When Power 5 schools face off, it’s normally on a home-and-home basis, or in neutral-site showdowns staged in venues like the Georgia Dome and Jerry World, which have meant big revenue for both teams. For example, West Virginia and Alabama each were guaranteed $3.2 million last year in Atlanta.

While Saturday’s school-record payout stings a bit for the WVU bean counters, it also concerns the coaches who were forced to begin weeks-early preparation because of Georgia Southern’s unique option attack. Despite the 19.5-point spread, many sense that West Virginia is in for a fight.

Just like Florida was in 2013, when the Gators paid Georgia Southern $550,000 to come to The Swamp … and lost.