IU left with $84,339 hotel bill

When the basketball court had cleared, and the Final Four was all over, IU was left with an $84,339 hotel bill. \nJeff Fanter, director of media relations for the athletics department, said fans of each school in the Final Four were given hotel rooms to fill.\n"The NCAA enters an agreement with the city of Atlanta as part of being the host city. Each of the schools that make the tournament were allotted 600 rooms at three different properties for four nights," Fanter said. "In turn, we went and attempted to secure occupancy."\nOne hundred forty-five rooms went unoccupied after attempts by the athletics department to fill the rooms in a variety of ways, Fanter said.\n"It's a daunting task when on Monday morning you have 600 rooms to fill by the end of the week," Fanter said. "Atlanta is a city many fans would want to stay out of. When we called about the tickets, we would offer them the hotel at the rate that was being offered at the hotel. We did have some success for sure."\nFanter does attribute some of the vacancies to Easter weekend, and the availability of rooms outside of downtown Atlanta that would be cheaper.\n"We did it a number of different ways to try and secure occupancy of those rooms. We were not able to fill all of those. This is not unique to Indiana; the other schools had difficulty as well."\nThe hotel room agreement was made more through the NCAA and not through IU specifically, and Fanter said the NCAA is being very cooperative.\n"Obviously it's an expense we didn't expect," Fanter said. "Right now we're working through the steps we need to take. The NCAA has been extremely cooperative. They should definitely be commended for working with all of the schools."\nFanter did emphasize the cost will be taken care of, and the overall positive impact of the Final Four appearance shouldn\'t be overlooked.\n"The one thing that needs to be emphasized is you can't overlook the value of what our trip to the Final Four meant to the University, the community, the fans...it's a small price to pay," Fanter said. "It should not be blown out of scale."\nFanter said there are funds that exist to help cover the expense, but it is still uncertain from exactly where.\n"We just need to figure out where the funds are going to come from. There are funds that exist," Fanter said. "It's just going into our budget as another expense."\nOne possible avenue to look for funds, Fanter said, would be the increase in apparel merchandise purchases. But he noted the increase won't cover the hotel room cost, although the increase in apparel merchandising purchases have been substantial.\nIn March 2001, gross sales in merchandising through IU Outfitters were $58,000. In March of 2002, gross sales were at $305,000. Purchases on the internet can be attributed to that large increase, Fanter said.\n"We obviously got a ton of traffic on our site," Fanter said. "Not only our NCAA run, but the men's and women's Big Ten championships. Our budget does not work in the way that money from there can work to offset the cost of the hotel. But that is an example of one area that could certainly be analyzed." \nJeff Horan, assistant athletic director, said sales have slowed, but expects the momentum to continue through Christmas, and attributes the increase in sales to the successful season.\n"Winning. Excitement for our fans," Horan said. "The effect wanes, yet we're still seeing substantial increases."\nThe men's basketball team's run through the tournament brought a tradition of excellence back to IU and some people have called saying they are interested in being part of the athletic department, Fanter said.\n"The Final Four run brought a lot of people together, and instilled a lot of pride," he said. "It's a university wide thing. I've heard that admissions has had a huge boom in it's applicants."\nJane Gantz, senior associate director for the office of admissions, wouldn't comment on that specific situation but did say it was obviously good for the University.\n"It's terrific PR for us, obviously it is," she said.\nIn the long run, though, there are no calculations to determine how important the tournament run really was for the institution.\n"You have to look at in the big picture, what it meant for the University, what it meant for athletics as a whole," Fanter said. "When you look at the big picture, you cannot underestimate what this did for the University."\nHoran agreed, and added his own caveat.\n"I hope we get off to a strong start next year and take it all"