Sacramento State pact with MAC outlines fine print of football jump to FBS
Sacramento State will receive no television or broadcast revenue during its five-year term to play football in the Mid-Amercan Conference, according to a “memorandum of understanding” obtained by The Bee through a public records request, confirming reports about the agreement between the Hornets and the conference last month.
The university’s first payment to join the MAC is due relatively soon: The memorandum confirms Sacramento State will pay $18 million to join the conference, with that first $6 million payment due April 30. The other payments of $3 million apiece are due each December through 2030.
Additionally, Sacramento State will pay $75,000 in affiliate member fees that increase by 4% each year, and $130,000 in standard bowl fees charged to each team in the conference. The university will also pay $5 million to the NCAA for the move.
Including the cost of chartered planes for visiting football teams, Sacramento State is believed to be on the hook for more than $24 million.
Joining the MAC would vault the Hornets into the Football Bowl Subdivision, making them one of 138 teams to compete at college football’s highest — and potentially most lucrative — level.
The MOU calls for the university to make the move on July 1. The school would be on the hook for the full $18 million if it leaves the conference during five-year term. The memorandum is a precursor to a formalized affiliate-member agreement with the conference.
The memorandum, which was signed by MAC commissioner Jon Steinbrecher on Feb. 16, says Sacramento State won’t be eligible to receive broadcast revenue during its planned five-year term that runs through 2030. There’s nothing in the agreement that says that could change with a new broadcast deal after the current one expires.
College football TV revenue
The television deal for the MAC is considerably smaller than those of the “Power Four” conferences — the Big Ten, Southeastern Conference, Atlantic Coast Conference and Big 12 — which run in the hundreds of millions to billion-dollar ranges. The MAC’s deal, signed in 2014, was worth $100 million over 13 years, paying each member school roughly $670,000 annually through 2026-27.
The MOU also requires that Sacramento State procure from its players “all necessary releases and waivers from student-athletes for use of their name, image, or likeness.”
Sacramento State won’t be eligible for College Football Playoff revenue unless its reaches the playoffs, though it is ineligible for the postseason for the first two years. The CFP pays non-Power Four conferences revenue if any team from the conference makes the postseason tournament. Those revenues run from $4 million to $6 million per round, with another $3 million given each round to cover travel expenses.
Sacramento State leaders, who have been working to address the university’s $37 million budget shortfall, have said the football program will pay for the move to the FBS on its own despite the absence of broadcast revenue from the MAC.
The university plans to use revenue sources that include ticket sales, merchandise, sponsorships and “game guarantees” for playing non-conference opponents. Game guarantees are fees paid by the hope team to the visiting team. They often reach seven figures for smaller schoolers playing against Power Four teams.
As of Monday, the Hornets have two road games against nonconference opponents scheduled: Sept. 12 at Fresno State and Nov. 28 at Hawaii. The guarantees from those games have not been disclosed.
The school recently commissioned Collegiate Consulting to study the financial ramifications of the move to the FBS, which said the move will generate $194.4 million of economic impact, which included numbers from the controversial “advertising value equivalency” metric that assigns monetary value to exposure on television, social media and printed media.
The Hornets’ full football schedule for 2026 is expected to be released this month.
