Report: Kentucky putting nearly half of its revenue share budget into basketball

The University of Kentucky looks to be more in on its basketball with the revenue share than many thought. According to a report by CBS Sports' Matt Norlander, Kentucky is putting nearly half of its revenue share money into the basketball program. As many other programs put the bulk of their money into football, Kentucky seems to be more split than others.

The NIL revenue share caps college's athletic programs at $20.5 million to be able to share across their respective athletic programs. As football is known to bring in the bulk of nearly all athletic budgets, many colleges are giving the bulk of their revenue-sharing that sport. Kentucky, however, seems to be more evenly spread. According to Norlander, Kentucky is putting 45 percent of their revenue sharing cap space into the basketball program. He talked about that in-depth in a big article interviewing many basketball coaches at Peach Jam about NIL and the revenue share. While many SEC schools are spending below $3 million on basketball, Kentucky is operating with putting a much larger sum of its budget towards the basketball program.

"One expected exception is basketball-crazed Kentucky, which is believed to be at a 45% rev share of its $20.5 million cap for 2025-26," Norlander wrote. "There was talk of all SEC programs agreeing to an equal rev-share cap, but similar to the Big East situation, if Kentucky wants to put more emphasis on its basketball program (and sacrifice for less on the football side) than the likes of Alabama, Auburn or Tennessee, that's Kentucky's prerogative."

With how much Kentucky believes in its basketball program and expectations and standard set in the sport, the athletic department definitely isn't shying away from giving basketball its portion of the revenue. While many programs are operating with the model of 75 percent to football, 15 percent for men's basketball, 5 percent to women's basketball and 5 percent to other sports, Kentucky is taking a different route.