"Instead of telling each team you can do that and can't do that, we're asking them to voluntarily reduce their budgets in the best way they can," he said. "And we've had very good response."

The Cougars rely a lot on revenue from their nearly always sold-out 65,000-seat football stadium and from generous boosters. But in a down economy, they can't always rely on that money.

"Private donations and ticket sales are a such a big part of our revenue, and so far ticket sales are going very well," Holmoe said. "If it wasn't for this economy, we would probably continue to raise ticket prices, but we froze our ticket sales this year for football in an effort to show understanding to our fans."

Recent "up" years have given BYU a nice rainy-day fund, which is helping this year.

"We're spending some of the reserves, but hopefully not all of it," Holmoe said. "Time will tell. We've projected to have a small surplus. If our coaches and administrators keep to the budget level and we are able to prognosticate what our revenue will be, then we'll be in good shape."

Holmoe said because of the tough times, plans for some facilities have been delayed.

"We have some real nice plans for the future that are put on hold for the time being," he said. "For instance, we don't know when we'll get to the next phase for our soccer stadium. We'll continue planning, but they won't come to fruition for a while."

Of all the in-state schools, Weber State is the only one that has actually had to lay off staff in recent months, including one in marketing. Jerry Graybeal, who has been athletic director for nearly four years, said his school tries to find ways to save money without jeopardizing the experience of the student-athletes or handcuffing the coaches.

One of the main things Weber has looked at is travel costs.

"We've tried to look at streamlining our costs for travel," said Graybeal. "That's a big one. Everyone got hit last year with the explosion of oil prices. It's expensive to travel regardless, but when possible we try to substitute a bus trip for a plane ride."

For example, the Weber State football team will take four bus trips this year and just two plane trips. In the past, the Wildcats have usually bused up to Montana or Montana State and always to Pocatello and flown elsewhere.

This year, besides busing to Missoula, the Wildcats will get quite familiar with I-80, with bus trips for games at Wyoming, Colorado State and Northern Colorado.

"This year we'll only have two flights, Portland State and Eastern Washington, and that will help us," Graybeal said. "We already pretty much travel bare bones anyway."