TRIVIA QUESTION TIME!
"The most valuable team in college basketball is..."
We'll give you a second to think about it...
Time's up!
If you guessed, Duke, Houston, or even the reigning national champion Florida Gators, you are wrong!
The correct answer is: the UNC basketball program!
A new study by the Wall Street Journal revealed that North Carolina is the most valuable team in college basketball. This ranking comes shortly after the UNC basketball program snuck into the NCAA Tournament. The Tar Heels hold an enterprise value of $378 million, eight million dollars more than the team second on the list (which also resides down the road in Durham).
"At $378 million, North Carolina’s men’s basketball team has the highest valuation in the sport, according to a new analysis by Ryan Brewer, an associate professor of finance at Indiana University Columbus. That ranked No. 1, just ahead of archrival Duke ($370 million), making the two schools on Tobacco Road the only teams that eclipsed $300 million in total value. "
Here are the top 10 rankings with their respective enterprise value:
Ranking | Institution Name | Value |
|---|---|---|
1 | North Carolina | 378,000,000 |
2 | Duke | 370,000,000 |
3 | Indiana | 279,000,000 |
4 | Ohio State | 262,000,000 |
5 | Louisville | 260,000,000 |
6 | Arizona | 257,000,000 |
7 | Syracuse | 256,000,000 |
8 | Illinois | 232,000,000 |
9 | Kentucky | 223,000,000 |
10 | Arkansas | 217,000,000 |
As the data above shows, there's a MAJOR gap between the second and third institutions on the list. North Carolina and Duke are well-above the rest, as North Carolina is nearly valued at 100 million dollars more than Indiana (the third-ranked university on the list).
While the recent talk has been about how the Atlantic Coast Conference went through a "down year" in men's college basketball, one thing hasn't changed: North Carolina and Duke remain superior in the college basketball world. North Carolina stands alone at the top of the list, as the program is still the most valued by a very large margin.
Men lie, women lie, numbers don't.