The controversy that swirled in Ann Arbor, Michigan, during the spring of 2006 evoked themes reminiscent of student protests a generation before. Critics charged that the university's egalitarian tradition was being threatened by a proposed facility designed to serve the “privileged few.” The proposal in question was a $226 million plan to renovate 80-year-old Michigan Stadium, the third-largest sports stadium in the world. The renovation would add the equivalent of two five-story buildings containing 82 enclosed luxury boxes overlooking the existing stands on both sides of the stadium. The university's athletic department argued that the new boxes would generate funds to cover other necessary renovations to the stadium, but opponents denounced it as a step toward commercialization and “a sad corruption of our university's defining traditions.” At its April meeting that year, the Michigan Board of Regents approved the plan, thus joining the majority of universities in the Big Ten that had already added such premium boxes to their stadiums.

The debate over these luxury boxes and the decision to go forward with the project are emblematic of the central financial tension surrounding big-time college sports. For better or worse, a big-time sports program is to a large extent an ordinary commercial firm, competing against other firms in a market that is subject to a regulatory environment unique to that market.