ACC hoops roster spending lags behind other power conferences

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DAYTON, OHIO - MARCH 17: Quadir Copeland #11 of the North Carolina State Wolfpack tries to shoot over Chendall Weaver #2 of the Texas Longhorns during the First Four round of the 2026 NCAA Men's Basketball tournament held at UD Arena on March 17, 2026 in Dayton, Ohio. (Photo by Ben Solomon/NCAA Photos via Getty Images) | NCAA Photos via Getty Images

The Athletic polled a bunch of power-conference coaches recently about NIL spending, asking them to estimate the average payroll for the teams within their respective leagues. The results show a pretty staggering increase from last season—SEC spending just about doubled, to about $18 million on average.

While the power-five conferences were all pretty similar last season, ranging between $8-$10 million in spending, there are larger gaps now; the ACC lags behind everyone at $11.5 million. Granted, you have to take these numbers with a grain of salt since they’re the result of coaches’ guestimating, and the ACC has plenty of competitive spenders, it’s just that it also has a number of schools spending very little as well.

The other reason for the SEC’s growing emergence? A lack of bottom-feeder teams who lag significantly behind their counterparts in spending. Comparatively, coaches said that most of the other high-major conferences — none more so than the ACC — still have chasm-like gaps between their highest- and lowest-spending programs.

“It’s a little harder to calculate the average of an 18-team league,” one ACC assistant added, “when the gap is over $20 million.”

Louisville, Duke, UNC, Virginia, and Miami would be my guess for the top five spenders, in some order. As for the bottom five: Wake Forest, Stanford, Cal, FSU, and … Virginia Tech? Georgia Tech? Boston College seems to have upped its spending at least somewhat following its coaching change but might still be near the bottom as well. Twenty million is a huge gap, but there are definitely some schools that are getting little or nothing beyond what NIL funds are being allotted from the $21 million pool (so $4-$5 million).

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