I know it's counter-intuitive but joining Drake, Butler, and Valpo with a non-scholarship football program is an easy way to boost enrollment.
Non-scholarship football program expenses at that level are about $1.2 million annually.
Drake averages about 2,500 attendance and tickets are about $10 so annual ticket revenue is only about $125,000.
Bradley tuition per student is about $42K (not including housing and living expenses which are mostly captured by the school). If you match Drake's 109 football players that's $4,578,000 in tuition. Of course, plenty of them would qualify for some aid but that's a lot of room to work with.
It would probably necessitate a women's soccer program, bringing back swimming and diving, and starting women's bowling which all average about half-scholarships. It may also jeopardize men's soccer and/or baseball, which I'd hate to see even though neither is real hot at the moment.
