Evangel shrinks athletic team rosters, student athletic scholarships

Evangel University spent $9.9 million on scholarships for 509 student athletes during the 2025-26 year, providing an average award of $19,529. 

Going forward, the private institution plans to shrink team rosters, award fewer scholarships, and bring the average athletic scholarship closer to $16,000 – or roughly half the annual cost of tuition and fees. 

President Mike Rakes said an in-depth review showed Evangel was investing more in athletic scholarships than the national average and other universities its size.  

“With our benchmarks, what we found is that our athletic rosters were too high,” he said. 

Rakes said roster sizes swelled over time, driven in large part by a desire to increase enrollment and provide more financial support for students. 

He said after the review, Evangel’s Board of Trustees decided to “right size” team rosters. They are expected to start shrinking in time for the 2027 spring and fall athletic seasons. 

“It’s been a hard decision because we had more athletes than we actually had spots for them to play on the field,” Rakes said. “The board was saying get consistent, we don’t want to make a promise to an athlete that they can come play, and they get a jersey and ride the bus but never see the field because they could play somewhere else. That’s not fair.” 

Evangel sponsors 16 varsity sports teams: men’s baseball and football, women’s softball and volleyball, and men’s and women’s teams for basketball, cross country, golf, soccer, track and field, and tennis. 

“It’s allowing the coaches to be intentional about who they recruit and intentional about getting team members who are going to play,” Rakes said. 

Michael Kolstad, executive vice president and chief of staff at Evangel, said the average athletic scholarship last year covered 64% of the annual cost of tuition and fees. He said the goal is to move closer to covering 50%, an estimated savings of $633,000. 

He said each coach will receive a specific amount for scholarships using a formula that multiplies their adjusted roster size – set based on national averages – and half of the cost of tuition and fees annually, which is roughly $16,000.  

For example, if a team has 10 spots, the coach would receive $160,000 in scholarship funds to distribute.  

Kolstad said coaches will have fewer scholarship dollars overall but can still offer a “full ride” to certain players. 

“If you want to go get that star quarterback and given him however much, that’s great, but you’re going to have less to give to your kicker, or another position,” he said. “The coaches will have full control over that.” 

Rakes told the Springfield Business Journal in mid-May that the board, in an effort to curb expenses, decided to cut the men’s and women’s tennis teams. He said there had been no talk of cutting other teams. However, between that interview and the scheduled announcement of that decision, Rakes led a successful effort to keep the tennis teams, Kolstad said. 

Kolstad said while the decision appeared final a few weeks ago, meetings were held to talk about the impact of the move on student athletes. 

“If the president, as he learns things, becomes passionate about the project, he goes to the board and says ‘Hey, we need to rethink this,’” Kolstad said. “In the case of tennis, that is exactly what happened.” 

He said future tennis teams will be smaller and travel less to save money. 

Last year, the Valor Tennis rosters included 18 men and 15 women. Part of those were seniors who recently graduated.  

Players hailed from Arkansas, Iowa, Indiana, Missouri, Oklahoma, New Mexico and Texas and brought international students from Africa, Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, Serbia and Venezuela. 

Prior to the reversal, Rakes told SBJ that eliminating the tennis program was expected to save $100,000 in operational costs – a coach’s salary plus travel costs – in addition to any scholarships awarded to students. 

Kolstad said short-term savings don’t always pay off because cutting an athletic team or program may lower the number of students.  

“We have to factor in the amount of revenue we’re going to lose by not having those students,” he said. “We might save $100,000 in operations, but we’re giving up $400,000 in revenue.”