Friday, Dec. 15, 2006 | 7:19 a.m.
Last week I bumped into Daren Libonati, the director of the Thomas & Mack Center and Sam Boyd Stadium, at the Las Vegas Bowl kickoff luncheon. He was wearing a black cowboy hat, a Western shirt and a crisp pair of Wranglers.
At first, I thought some bareback rider from Cheyenne had made a wrong turn on the way to the National Finals Rodeo.
The real reason that Libonati was dressed like Roy Rogers is that he gets it. He understands what a ... pardon the expression ... cash cow the NFR is, both to the community and his employer.
There are some within the UNLV men's basketball program who wish somebody would spur the NFR back to Oklahoma City or Gilley's honky-tonk in Pasadena, Texas, or wherever it is all those cowboys, both the real and urban kind, come from. Not Libonati. He knows where his Texas toast is buttered.
(I might add here that UNLV won a national championship in basketball in 1990 when it rarely practiced at the Mack. I also might add that the Rebels are coming off an NFR-mandated road trip during which they went 3-1, with the only loss coming at Arizona. When you play good defense, the road isn't as scary a place as basketball coaches make it out to be.)
But speaking of cash cows, that's exactly what the Thomas & Mack and to a lesser extent, Sam Boyd Stadium, are when it comes to balancing UNLV's athletic budget. During these lean times on the playing field, the facilities, and the revenues they generate when the Rebels aren't using them, are UNLV's blank check, its American Express card.
Maybe the Rebels could still leave home without them. But they probably wouldn't get very far.
Because Libonati and his staff have proven to be such good sports and concert promoters, the Thomas & Mack has pumped $2.9 million into the athletic coffers in each of the past three years, which is just a little more than the football program's operating deficit of $2.5 million.
UNLV still manages to balance its budget with a little left over for athletic tape and Gatorade. But take away the allowance from its stadiums and an additional $4.8 million it receives from the state Legislature and it skews the profit margin.
"My guess is when you take that out, it severely changes whether you call that a profit or a loss," said Chancellor Jim Rogers, during one of his recent diatribes aimed at fixing what ails UNLV athletics.
My guess is that Rogers is absolutely correct.
Now I know the real reason Libonati was dressed like a cowboy. The athletic department keeps riding his back to pay its bills.
It's a situation that was born out of necessity a long time ago. When Jerry Tarkanian was run out of town by his own administration 15 years ago, a lot of people around here stopped going to basketball games. While the basketball program continues to turn a tidy profit, it's not enough to offset all those 2-9 football seasons.
That's when Dennis Finfrock and his right-hand man Pat Christenson, who ran the sports facilities before Libonati (who worked under them), were called onto a very short carpet.
"When Dennis and I were hired, we were told we don't have a job unless we generate some money," said Christenson, who eventually left UNLV to become chief of Las Vegas Events, which produces and presents many of the events that drive tourism in Las Vegas.
Today the Thomas & Mack and Sam Boyd Stadium generate a lot of money, which is why the big shots in the UNLV athletic department can continue to play golf or however they pass the time when they should be out raising money.
Last year, according to a recent study that was commissioned to determine whether Las Vegas needs a new arena to replace the 23-year-old Thomas & Mack, the UNLV sports facilities generated annual revenues of $28.9 million with operating costs of $22.1 million. That leaves a big black number of $6.8 million on the bottom line.
But what happens if, say, the Maloof brothers come up with a plan to finance a new $400 million arena here? How would that affect the UNLV sports nest egg?
According to the study, the UNLV arenas would go from hosting 126 events per year to roughly 70. Operating overhead would be greatly reduced, and the basketball team would have more time to practice its 3-point shots.
But what about that $2.9 million check that Libonati writes to athletics at the end of every fiscal year?
"That's what you'll lose," Christenson said. "You will not have the revenue surplus that you have had in the past."
Now you know another reason why Jim Rogers keeps climbing on that soap box.
archive
