Best Colleges for Sports Management and Sports Business: Where the Industry Actually Recruits

Sports management is one of the most popular "I love sports, now what?" majors, and the programs vary more than most families realize. Some live in business schools, some in kinesiology departments, and some stand on their own. Some require a semester-long internship; others leave it up to you. And the honest truth about the industry is that entry-level jobs are competitive, often start in ticket sales or operations, and reward people who show up with experience and a network. The programs below have the track records, structures, and alumni pipelines that make a real difference. If you want to hear how a program works from someone in it, SchoolScoops connects families with current students at several of these schools.

How to Compare Sports Management Programs

• Where the program lives. A business-school program gives you core finance, accounting, and marketing; a kinesiology or standalone program often has more sport-specific coursework. Neither is better — they lead to slightly different jobs.
• Required experience. Look for programs that build internships into the degree, not just recommend them.
• Alumni network. Ask where graduates from the last three years work, not just famous alumni from decades ago.
• Access to live events. A big athletic department or nearby pro teams means more chances to work games and events while you're in school.

Ohio University — The Original

Ohio University started the world's first sports administration program in 1966, inspired by Los Angeles Dodgers owner Walter O'Malley, and its graduate program has been ranked at or near the top of SportBusiness's international rankings for more than a decade. Undergraduates can earn a sport management major inside the College of Business, which gives them a business core plus access to one of the largest alumni networks in the field. The tradeoff is location: Athens is a small, isolated college town, so internships with pro teams usually mean summers elsewhere. Ask how undergraduates connect with the graduate program's alumni.

UMass Amherst — Isenberg's McCormack Department

The Mark H. McCormack Department of Sport Management at UMass started in 1971, making it one of the country's earliest sport management programs, and it's named for the founder of the sports agency IMG. It sits inside the Isenberg School of Management, so students get a full business education. Learn more about the undergraduate sport management major. Its New England location puts Boston's pro teams within driving distance. Ask how students land in-season internships and how competitive admission into Isenberg is for your profile.

University of Oregon — The Warsaw Sports Business Center

Oregon's Warsaw Center, founded in 1993, describes itself as the first program of its kind within a business school, and it renamed itself the Warsaw Sports Business Center to reflect how broad its focus has become. Undergraduates join through the Lundquist College of Business with a sports business concentration, and the program's ties to the athletic-brand industry in the Portland area — including Nike's headquarters in Beaverton, about two hours from Eugene rather than next to campus — are a real differentiator. The tradeoff is that the concentration builds on a business major, so you need to be admitted to Lundquist first. Ask how many students land roles with brands versus teams and leagues.

Syracuse University — Falk College

Syracuse's sport management B.S. requires a full-semester, 12-credit senior capstone internship, usually with a sports organization outside Syracuse — one of the most structured experience requirements in the field. Falk also launched what it described as the first undergraduate sport analytics degree housed within a sport management program, and offers a dual degree with the Whitman School of Management. The JMA Wireless Dome on campus doubles as a working lab for event operations. The tradeoff: Syracuse winters are long, and the price tag is high. Ask how capstone placements are arranged.

University of Michigan — School of Kinesiology

Michigan's sport management program lives in the School of Kinesiology rather than the business school, and it benefits from one of the largest athletic departments in the country and a huge alumni network. Students run organizations like the Michigan Sport Business Conference, which gives them real event-planning and networking experience. The tradeoff is that you're competing for attention with Ross business students for some opportunities. Ask how sport management students use Michigan's broader alumni network.

University of South Carolina — Tepper Department

South Carolina's David and Nicole Tepper Department of Sport and Entertainment Management was renamed in 2025 for Carolina Panthers owner David Tepper and his wife Nicole. Its undergraduate degree builds in two internships and lets students focus on sport, entertainment, or venue and event management — a good fit if you're interested in concerts and live events as well as sports. The tradeoff is that it's a large public university, so students need to seek out opportunities. Ask how the entertainment and venue tracks connect to real employers.

A Note on Alternatives

A sports management major isn't the only path into the industry. Plenty of team, league, and brand executives studied business, economics, communications, data science, or law and built their sports experience through internships and campus jobs. If a school you love doesn't have a dedicated program, ask how students there break into sports anyway.

Questions Worth Asking on Your Visit

• Is the internship required, and does the school help place students or leave it to them?
• Where did last year's graduates start, and what were their roles?
• How many students work events for the athletic department, and is that paid?
• Can sport management students take business, data, or communications electives easily?

Final Thoughts

The best sports management program is the one that gets you real experience early and connects you to people who hire. Compare structures, not rankings, and talk to students about what the internship search actually looked like. To set up a conversation with a current student, see how SchoolScoops works.

→ Browse all available schools or visit SchoolScoops.com.

Photo credits: IJK2010 / CC BY-SA 4.0; cropped and converted to WebP. The adapted hero and card photographs retain the linked source license; this license applies to the photographs, not the article.