Cancellation Of Maryland Game Costs Towson Football $325,000

TOWSON, MD – When the Big Ten Conference announced last week it was canceling games that were scheduled against non-league opponents due to ongoing coronavirus concerns, the biggest loser – at least financially – were smaller football programs that were set up for big paydays to face bigger-name Division I opponents.

Count Towson University’s program among them.

Last week’s announcement wiped the Tigers’ Sept. 5 game at Maryland off the slate and with it – a $325,000 payment the university was to have received. Athletic Director Tim Leonard confirmed that the school would not receive the money to the Baltimore Sun and issued a statement that does not speak to the financial impact to the program.

Before the game was cut from the schedule, athletic department officials had mandated that each of the university's teams cut to its budget by 25 percent due to the pandemic as a trade-off for the school not laying off or furloughing any employees, the Sun reported.

“While we are disappointed in not being able to play Maryland this fall, safety comes before this unique game with our fellow USM [University System of Maryland] institution,” Leonard said, according to The Sun. “We look forward to visiting College Park in 2023.”

Towson has twice been paid more than $500,000 to face bigger-name opponents. In 2012, the Tigers were paid $510,000 to travel to Louisiana State for a 38-22 loss and was given $500,000 to travel to Florida to face the Gators in Gainesville, which resulted in a 38-0 loss.

The contract for the Maryland game was signed in 2012, The Sun reported, stated that “exigencies beyond the control of either party, such as Acts of God, Acts of common enemy, civil disorders, or orders of military or public authority, may render it impossible to or highly undesirable to play the game. … Under such circumstances and the Home Team and the Visiting Team agree to cancel the game, [the payment] of this contract shall be null and void.”