"They love it," he said. "They love our athletic program."

So what does the future hold for the Beehive State's athletic programs?

While there are a lot of worries among the athletic directors, there's still an overall feeling of optimism.

"Next year is really going to be a tremendous financial challenge," said Hill. "On the income side we're lacking a money game like we had with Michigan and we're not raising ticket prices. We're projecting our contributions to be flat and costs continue to go up. We're looking to have a very rough next year and using most of our reserve fund, just to balance."

"The big challenge that remains to be seen is revenue," said Holmoe. "There are a few things we've planned for that we think are very important so certain areas of our budget we have increased and certain areas we've backed down. We don't have a huge fear, but we're going into it carefully. We don't want to shut down anything. We want to do the things that will not cause us to fall back."

Weber State is happy to be getting nearly a half-million dollars for its two games at Wyoming and Colorado State this fall that will help the future budget.

"It's a tough schedule, but they're both games we can bring a good portion of the money back and hopefully pay it forward for years to come," said Graybeal.

Beazer said, "I fully anticipate it to be more difficult for us because we're bringing volleyball on line. We've pushed our programs so far, adding women's golf two years ago and increased scholarships for most of our sports. We've been pushing and pushing; I just hope we haven't outrun our supply line. Any more unforeseen expenses could really force some tough decisions."

"I know expenses are going to go up next year, but our budget will be pretty much the same, so we'll have to make it work within that same realm," said Jacobsen. "We hope we don't get in a situation where we have to make bigger cuts than we have to this point, but right now we're going to be OK and make some adjustments with what we do have."

If any school has reason to worry, it's Utah State, but Barnes is staying upbeat about the future.

"Even given the economic challenges, we've got tremendous momentum in our program and the light at the end of the tunnel with student fees and self-generated revenue is up substantially," he said. "I view this as a short time period of tremendous challenge. We've just got to be strong and vigilant in executing our plan and we'll get through it."

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