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No I mean he transferred from SLU…unless I’m slipping

Abonnel is one of those rare NAIA transfers. I say rare, but I really have no idea how many guys make the transition from NAIA to Division I.

For those who do not understand how the government works. This is just the initial step in turning tax free corporations and businesses into fully taxable status. It starts slowly and with clear guidelines targeting the revenue of a few tax free companies with large endowments and active investments in the private sector. In time the tax free companies become very limited in number as the number of prior tax free companies decreases. This is the way income taxes were first applied, they were limited only to the extremely wealthy and strictly limited to them. That status did not remain the case for long. After a number of years income taxes were extended to cover most of the population.

Abonnel transferred?

The roster lists Jeremi Abonnel. I thought he had exhausted his eligibility, but I guess not. If I had transferred to St. Louis in January, I might want to move back to Florida too.

Thanks for the answers - OG and LE

There are also public universities with large endowments that own or partially own some startups who are exempt from this tax.

@cheeseman I think the primary target of this tax on private school endowment revenue are the schools with very large endowments that own many startup companies and profit heavily from their startups. I am talking about Harvard, Duke, and the like. Small schools with very small endowment revenue are exempt from paying this endowment revenue if they are below certain levels. This tax is not intended to bankrupt smaller schools with small endowment revenue, not yet anyways.

The 8% is a top rate that only applies if the endowment exceeds $2 million per enrolled student. Harvard’s endowment, per an article I found in the Harvard Crimson, is about $2.9 million per enrolled student. It is on the revenue apparently, it will cost Harvard about $200 million per year. If it were on the whole thing, 8% of $53 Billion is about $4.25 billion. As to why, it was politically targeted. The universities looking at the highest tax rate are Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford and MIT. I guess taxing public schools would been politically impossible to pass. The tax is 4% for between $750,000 and $2 Mil per student, 1.4% for $500,000 to $750,000, and nothing if the endowment doesn’t exceed $500,000 pers enrolled student. For those wondering, SLU with $1.7 Billion in endowment and about 15,200 students works out to approximately $112,000 pers student enrolled, so we are well under the threshold. Davidson, at $1.3 Billion in endowment and only about 1800 students is at $722,000 per student, so they are now in some trouble. Article from The Harvard Crimson https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2025/7/5/big-beautiful-bill-endowment-tax/ Edit: Turns out there is a provision that an institution must have an enrollment of 3000, or the tax does not apply. Davidson is off the hook at only 1800 enrollment. There are a couple of other things in here that will affect all universities. The Federal Grad Plus loan program is gone, Parent PLUS loans are now capped at $65,000 (these two will affect grad students most). It consolidates loan repayments and eliminates some borrower protections, including deferment for economic hardship and unemployment. So lose your job and you still have to make payments on your student loan. Also, programs whose graduates earn less than the median income of a high school graduate risk all further Federal loans.

Related questions - this Big Ugly Bill will tax private universities endowment up from 1.4% to 8% - correct, is this only on the revenue or the entire endowment? Next, why not tax the revenue of public universities endowments?

Are you sure you didn't just drop acid?

Maybe about St Bonaventure, but they have an endowment of only $92.3 Mil, very little room for error, so they had best be on top of things. If D1 sports gets too expensive for them, they must be proactive about doing something quickly. Davidson has over 13 times the endowment fund, so much more room for error. Both Fordham and Loyola-Chicago have over 16K students enrolled and around 1 Billion in endowment funds each. You would think that would give them all the revenue they would need, but this back of the envelope stuff does not include their debt payments, or how well they are managing their expenses. It is possible to screw things up if they are not on top of their expenses. Even public schools are not immune from the issue of declining enrollment. If fewer students in a state are going to school, it’s going to be hard to get politicians to give out more money to schools, and one condition I could see added to that money is no funding for sports, only academics. Time will tell how this plays out over the coming years. But schools deciding to give up D1 sports is not irrational depending on their circumstances.

Bonaventure is not in any financial danger and is in fact one of the better managed schools fiscally in the A10. Their small enrollment has been an advantage to them. Davidson is in a similar situation. LaSalle, Fordham, & Loyola are the most in trouble financially. LaSalle is by far the worst, but Fordham is catching up. Loyola's current struggles appear to be manageable. it is a dream scenario but getting LaSalle and Fordham to drop D-1 athletics isn't that far off. I don't think LaSalle makes it to 2030 & Fordham could cut out at any time.

Another A10 university who may have financial problems is St Bonaventure. The Bonnie’s have only a 92.3 Mil endowment fund, and only 2381 total students, so much less operating revenue coming in, harder to keep funding D1 sports. LaSalle, with 5191 students, gets a lot more revenue coming in on a yearly basis. No one else seems in immediate financial danger, next lowest endowments are URI and GMU at 203 Mil and 222 Mil respectively, but not only do they have 16k and 35k enrollments, they are both public schools, so as long as they get money from their state governments, they are good. Beyond that is St Joe’s, 7568 enrollment and 378 Mil endowment fund, doesn’t really seem to be in immediate trouble. While Davidson only has an enrollment of about 1843, they are sitting on a 1.3 Billion endowment fund. As a wildcard, any university may decide to kill sports or go down to D3 because it makes financial sense to them at any time. Not sure I see that in the immediate future, but if there’s no way to control costs, they may decide they have to.

It appears to me that however LaSalle manages to maintain its accreditation, they will have to let go D1 level sports and NILs. In other words I cannot see how LaSalle can maintain its membership in A10 and maintain its accreditation. There may be another opening for other schools in A10, coming soon.

Like comparing Harvard with SLU.

Latest figures I could find were from 2023, but here’s the comparison: SLU Endowment fund size - $1.731 Billion LaSalle University Endowment fund size - $71.7 Million Yeah, they might be in some trouble…

More evidence of the major issue facing universities across the US, shrinking enrollment.

LaSalle University’s accreditation is being threatened by the Middle States Commission on Higher Education due to shaky finances. The University must prepare a report for the Commission by February 16, 2026 outlining their financial sustainability. If they survive as a university, can they continue to support Division 1 sports? The A-10 may end up with one less member one way or another.

SLU Men’s Soccer is using the roster limit exemption opportunity. New roster limit is 28 for Women and Men. The Women are at 28. The Men are at 30 as they will use the exemption opportunity to keep 2 extra players to finish out their careers at SLU. Eventually SLU Men’s Soccer will get down to 28 annually. All 28 Men’s roster spots, and all 28 Women’s roster spots, can be full scholarships. SLU isn’t expected to fill all 28 scholarships at capacity. But SLU is expected to increase full scholarship amounts on both teams to remain competitive in the landscape. SLU added 3 transfers mid semester. They uniquely lost 1 of them after the Spring season. (Transferred to a Fall opponent which will be fun). And they added 2 Spring May transfers as well as an International player.

Looking at roster: 5 Seniors, 6 Juniors, 6 Sophomores, 13 Freshman. Certainly will lean young overall but have to earn one’s time on the field. If a freshman can do that, more power to him. 24-ish years ago we had a crop of freshmen come through who started the season 10-0 led by Vedad. Regularly played seven freshmen that year too. Love to see impact like that from current crop of youngsters.

The major real cost to the University going forward, in terms of real money SLU must pay out, is going to be the revenue sharing part of the equation. While it appears we are roughly competitive this year in spending for Men’s basketball alone (who really knows after all, it’s just guessing since there’s no real numbers being given out), just how much will it rise next year? If this goes up at the same trajectory as the growth in NIL spending went in the past few years, this could get scary really quickly. And it’s not like SLU is driving the cost increases, they will have to respond to what the big schools are doing, just like NIL over the past few years.

I read your discourse, twice, and came to the conclusion that you know as much as I do....that is no idea what the accounting hit for athletic scholarships is to the Department. But they aren't free. It really doesn't matter how much they cost the Department, they do hit the bottom line of the Dept. Are you suggesting that adding scholarships beyond the two obvious programs is no big financial deal? I'm not sure why you think additional scholarships would be for additional students, students not already on SLU athletic teams. Those athletes, who could potentially receive a scholarship, are already enrolled. But that really doesn't matter. The point is after men's basketball's +2, their likely won't be any additional schollies this athletic year. Who is suggesting that a non-athlete student gets kicked out because an athlete gets a scholarship? That makes no sense. The Undergraduate Cost Of Attendance is listed on the SLU Website as $81,000. There are a lot of variables in that figure. This is not the cost to the university, it is the cost to the student. If you know that is wrong you should report that to the university. Yes, many students receive financial assistance and very few pay this full load. https://www.slu.edu/financial-aid/tuition-and-costs/cost-of-attendance.php Are each of the 15 men's and 15 women's hoop scholarships charged to the basketball program at $81,000? No. What the bottom line hit to the Dept is unknown. But there is a hit. Like it or not, Coach Schertz's basketball team will get the bulk of the Revenue Sharing bucket. Tillett reported today in Stu's article that she is getting some Revenue which helped in recruiting the transfer portal. In January, VCU reported that they will spend around $5million on Revenue Sharing. They didn't detail how it would be allocated. In March George Mason reported that their figure was $3million for Men's basketball. They mentioned no other sports nor additional scholarships.

Pat had his first four hit game Monday, he is up to an awesome 46 stolen bases and playing terrific defensive outfield

How much a scholarship costs a university is a murky and gray discussion. It all depends on what type of scholarship and what it covers. The cost of attendance is nothing. Books would cost SLU. Room & board would cost SLU. This would be something where SLU is losing the actual cost of what a non-athlete student would pay for that room If the athletes being provided a meal plan, that would cost SLU in some way. Not necessarily 100% of that value, however. Anything involving limited resources I don’t have the time to get more specific, there are some direct costs to the university.