[csa]

In the US, in no particular order:

- equipment

- coaches

- travel/hotel/per diems, sometimes long distance depending on league

- trainers

- workout facilities (typically shared)

- practice facilities (might be shared)

- game facilities

- additional dining options to accommodate training

- nutritionists

- doctors

- scholarship money for tuition

- scholarship money for room and board

- video review areas and equipment (shared)

- video recording equipment and videographers

- insurance

- announcers for events

- recruiting

- tutoring

- event management

- publicity/advertising

- title ix compliance official

Note that at some universities (even some high schools), there are self-funding booster clubs that will pay for a lot of this stuff for some sports. That said, there is still some stuff that the university has to pay for directly.

As a simple example, Alabama football (big program that makes tons of money) also funds Alabama’s championship teams in golf, softball, and gymnastics (and many other sports that have not led to national championships).

[jessaustin]

If money is unlimited, you could come up with reasons to fund all of the junk you've listed. For GP's example of a college fencing team, they need 1) occasional use of a well-ventilated room with a hard floor [and one or two electrical outlets if they're using that fancy electronic scoring] and 2) storage for their equipment when they're not using the room. Literally nothing else is needed. Few fans would ever pay to see fencing, so these actual student-athletes don't need any more compensation than the room and the storage. Equipment can be funded by donations and dues. Coaches should mostly be volunteers, but if someone needs payment that can also be from dues or donated.

(Source: I played on my college club kendo team. If anything the needs of fencing are less than those of kendo.)

[csa]

At most schools, what you are describing are called “club sports”. These sports have much less funding from the university, and they are ubiquitous.

The next logical question is probably “why aren’t all sports club sports?” The short answer is that varsity football and basketball are often direct or indirect money makers for the school that warrant funding for competitiveness, and title ix that says that there has to be access to sports at equal levels (typically this means a university needs a few women’s sports that have equivalent quality equipment, facilities, etc. as football and basketball).

[jessaustin]

Yes, I know about club sports since, as I said above, I played on a club team. All college sports should be operated as club sports. Since that's not going to happen for football and men's basketball in USA, it also won't happen for women's basketball and say, probably, women's soccer. Everything else that we're supposed to clutch our pearls about, however? Swimming, track, tennis, baseball, and various other even less watchable sports? Those are club sports. That is not an injustice to swimmers and tennis players. If they had what it takes to be "the best", they wouldn't be wasting their time on a college team.

[chrisseaton]

I just don’t get why a university amateur golf team needs anything but a few people and their golf gear. Why take it so seriously?

[csa]

It’s a business decision and it’s law.

1. If a certain sports outcome (e.g., beating a rival, league championship, etc.) will lead to an increase in alumni donations, then it might be considered prudent to invest some money into that program.

2. Title ix creates weird incentive structures for athletic programs, with a default assumption being that the university is guilty of discrimination if there isn’t a lot of equal treatment for all sports (both men and women). Note that this has helped funding for women’s sports a lot (the disparity was almost comical in the 80s and prior), but it has also led to the elimination of some fringe men’s varsity sports (some of which became clubs).

[yupper32]

Because everyone else you're competing against is taking it seriously.

Please try to step back and understand why people take it seriously and truly care about sports. You don't seem to understand and don't seem to be actually trying to understand. It's exhausting trying to have conversations like the OP topic when people come in and degrade high level sports at its core.

[chrisseaton]

People take sports seriously in other countries as well. I took sports seriously. I just didn’t have an expectation of professional facilities for a social sports team in spare time at uni.

[yupper32]

I don't know what more to tell you.

If you want to compete at a high level in the US you often need to fulfill that long list of requirements a few posts above, unless it's a very niche sport.

You can also play pickup basketball down the street with nothing more than the court and a ball. There's nothing wrong with that, but don't expect that to convert to any kind of high level play.

[jessaustin]

It's fine to care about sports. It's fine to devote most of your time to preparation for competition. It's unseemly for institutions dedicated to academics to divert vast funds to non-academic pursuits. Most of the spending on collegiate sport generates tiny performance gains, and since all college teams are spending this money there is something of a Red Queen situation so those tiny performance gains change cumulative results not at all.

Also, for nearly every sport except football and women's basketball, the real talent in the college age group isn't even playing college sports. Sports are meaningful with or without access to the latest most expensive amenities.

[chrisBob]

That is an easy argument for an outsider to make in virtually any situation. The answer is probably similar to the reason you aren't doing your programming job on an 11" chrome book.

[chrisseaton]

Other countries don’t even remotely approach social university sports teams like this and still have fun and generate elite athletes.

[csa]

Outside of the US, elite athletes are often members of non-university clubs. These clubs are supported well and often have very good funding.