Not surprisingly, at $434,095 (publicly divulged, of course), Kentucky's recruiting budget comes in at #1 overall amongst men's basketball programs at public schools in BCS conferences. Our neighbors in Lexington spent nearly $180,000 more than Louisville (#6 overall; $263,391 budget), three times as much as their opponent tonight, the Ohio State Buckeyes (#26; $152,981), and nearly eight times more than Wisconsin (#53; $57,397), who lost to Butler last night in the Sweet 16.
To their credit, UK's 2011 class is currently ranked #1 by ESPN (updated yesterday). These young recruits these days. They want to be Kentucky so bad that poor Calipari has to spend four and a half times as much money on recruiting them to Lexington than Roy Williams at North Carolina (#45; $98,517).
What may surprise you is who's doing more with less: Rutgers. The men's team. SRSLY. The Scarlet Knights spent just $74,902 (next to last) but currently own one of the fifteen best 2011 recruiting classes according to ESPN.
The entire list is included after the jump below.
Here's the entire list of 2010-2011 men's basketball recruiting budgets via Eben Novy-Williams and his story on Bloomberg.com.
Below are recruiting expenditures**, ranked from highest to lowest, for public schools in the Big Ten, Big 12, Big East, Southeastern Conference, Atlantic Coast Conference and Pac-10.
1. Kentucky -- $434,095
2. Kansas -- $419,228
3. Florida -- $326,306
4. Arkansas -- $322,517
5. Oklahoma -- $316,755
6. Louisville -- $263,391
7. Iowa State -- $254,584
8. West Virginia -- $223,632
9. Auburn -- $222,128
10. Arizona -- $215,246
11. Alabama -- $209,218
12. Virginia Tech -- $197,269
13. Illinois -- $187,157
14. Georgia -- $186,906
15. Michigan -- $186,732
16. Clemson -- $180,621
17. Minnesota -- $176,677
18. Connecticut -- $175,740
19. Arizona State -- $174,682
20. Virginia -- $173,884
21. Texas -- $164,935
22. Missouri -- $163,800
23. Kansas State -- $161,567
24. Oregon State -- $159,763
25. Nebraska -- $159,166
26. Ohio State -- $152,981
27. Cincinnati -- $151,341
28. Georgia Tech -- $149,516
29. South Florida -- $148,778
30. Indiana -- $143,287
31. UCLA -- $141,824
32. Texas A&M -- $138,584
33. South Carolina -- $132,758
34. Texas Tech -- $132,268
35. Washington State -- $131,193
36. California -- $126,678
37. Tennessee -- $122,675
38. Colorado -- $121,759
39. Oregon -- $119,152
40. Oklahoma State -- $117,364
41. Washington -- $113,421
42. Michigan State -- $108,478
43. Louisiana State -- $107,164
44. Maryland -- $100,551
45. North Carolina -- $98,517
46. Purdue -- $97,123
47. Florida State -- $93,119
48. Mississippi -- $90,935
49. North Carolina State -- $87,613
50. Mississippi State -- $79,285
51. Iowa -- $76,547
52. Rutgers -- $74,902
53. Wisconsin -- $57,397
**According to expense reports from 53 schools obtained through open-records requests. Private schools such as Duke University aren't required to divulge the information (Editor: please also note that teams like UNLV and Memphis from conferences such as the Mountain West and Conference USA were not included either).