[Card10Fan]

It's about money. South Carolina's charter alone to play at Stanford is six figure Staley quoted and they had to scrap and beg to get a 2nd game in the area. They will play 2 games while in California. Tara said west coast schools have to pay more for guarantee games  for teams to come out and play them because of location and travel costs.  

I presume Stanford and South Carolina (or their conferences) are getting good dollars for this trip from ESPN.

Of course, the cost of the charter isn't likely to be dependent on whether the first leg is flying west or east.   Also, it isn't clear to me how much of the cost is per mile, versus for the days rented.  This year, the cost per mile is likely to be way up.  It also isn't clear how much of that cost is based on the specific team.    The charter flight isn't going to be the only expense:  hotel rooms are expensive in the Stanford area (but at least they aren't sold out or at a ridiculous premium on football weekends).

Rice University WBB is playing St. Mary's and Pacific this week.  They're flying 2/3 as far, so their travel cost is going to be 2/3 as much (roughly).   I doubt Rice is getting even 1/4 of the TV revenue that South Carolina will be getting.  (And imagine what it is like for the University of Hawaii (any team), or Stanford Field Hockey, or (in coming years) USC/UCLA.)

You'd think the PAC-12 & WCC coaches could get together (virtually) and come up with some coordinated schedule for these long distance opponents.  Ditto for the east coast coaches.


Has anyone added up the carbon footprint of US sports travel?  It must be quite large.

Good points all around. I also would note since Covid, chartering flights has become the norm for college basketball. We took a charter to Portland for Sundays game and I’m certain aside from the Bahamas trip, we chartered all other road trips with flights required last year. Chartering is more expensive than commercial flights but I’m sure once you’ve experienced chartering, it would be very hard to go back.  not to mention being able to fly back the same night after a game to help cut down on missing classes etc.

[Card10Fan]

It's about money. South Carolina's charter alone to play at Stanford is six figure Staley quoted and they had to scrap and beg to get a 2nd game in the area. They will play 2 games while in California. Tara said west coast schools have to pay more for guarantee games  for teams to come out and play them because of location and travel costs.  

I presume Stanford and South Carolina (or their conferences) are getting good dollars for this trip from ESPN.

Of course, the cost of the charter isn't likely to be dependent on whether the first leg is flying west or east.   Also, it isn't clear to me how much of the cost is per mile, versus for the days rented.  This year, the cost per mile is likely to be way up.  It also isn't clear how much of that cost is based on the specific team.    The charter flight isn't going to be the only expense:  hotel rooms are expensive in the Stanford area (but at least they aren't sold out or at a ridiculous premium on football weekends).

Rice University WBB is playing St. Mary's and Pacific this week.  They're flying 2/3 as far, so their travel cost is going to be 2/3 as much (roughly).   I doubt Rice is getting even 1/4 of the TV revenue that South Carolina will be getting.  (And imagine what it is like for the University of Hawaii (any team), or Stanford Field Hockey, or (in coming years) USC/UCLA.)

You'd think the PAC-12 & WCC coaches could get together (virtually) and come up with some coordinated schedule for these long distance opponents.  Ditto for the east coast coaches.


Has anyone added up the carbon footprint of US sports travel?  It must be quite large.

Good points all around. I also would note since Covid, chartering flights has become the norm for college basketball. We took a charter to Portland for Sundays game and I’m certain aside from the Bahamas trip, we chartered all other road trips with flights required last year. Chartering is more expensive than commercial flights but I’m sure once you’ve experienced chartering, it would be very hard to go back.  not to mention being able to fly back the same night after a game to help cut down on missing classes etc.