University of Washington Enters Football Stadium Naming Rights Deal With Columbia Bank

SEATTLE — For at least 10 years, Husky Stadium, home of the Washington Huskies football team, will have a new moniker of Columbia Bank Stadium.

It was announced Thursday that the University of Washington entered a 10-year football stadium naming rights agreement with Columbia Bank.

According to a post on "X" from On Montlake's Christian Caple, the deal is worth $70 million total ($7 million a year).

Washington's naming rights for the football stadium were available for negotiation after a 10-year, $42 million contract with Alaska Airlines (signed in 2015) expired. That previous deal also included naming rights for the basketball arena at Hec Ed Pavilion. Unlike the new deal with Columbia Bank, the airline's deal with the university included field-naming rights, not stadium naming rights.

Following the expiration of the previous deal with Alaska Airlines, the company and the university entered an exclusive renegotiation agreement that resulted in a new 10-year, $28.4 million deal to maintain naming rights for the basketball arena.

This new deal will mark the first time in the history of the university that the football stadium will don the moniker of a namebrand partner. It was originally known as University of Washington Stadium before being renamed to Husky Stadium after the 1970 season.

"It's always about the students," Huskies athletic director Pat Chun said in a news conference Thursday. "And I remind everyone that's bigger than the young men that wear our jerseys. Band, spirit, (Harry the Husky) and, most especially, the students in the crowd. That is what makes college athletics so special. ... I do understand the passion for Washington and Husky football and that same passion is (with) wide change — change is change and change is difficult. But that's what makes college sports so special, is people are passionate about their school."

Chun and Washington president Robert J. Jones said that finding a partner with similar values was a paramount focus of the university.

Columbia Bank is headquartered in Tacoma, Wash., and its former company CEO and founder, William Phillip, was instrumental in the effort of establishing the University of Washington-Tacoma campus.

Chun, Jones and Columbia Bank co-president Chris Merrywell (who were all present at the news conference) mentioned work beyond college athletics, with Merrywell mentioning the potential of a near-campus branch of the bank ran and operated by students.

In terms of athletics-specific endeavors, the new deal is expected to help in the football program's Name, Image, Likeness (NIL) efforts. Entering the season, the UW football team ranked near the bottom of the Big Ten and Power Four programs in money allocated to roster payroll.

The university's official news release mentioned programs such as "Fueling the Dawgs," which will go to the athletic department's nutrition program; the "Purple Passport Program," which pertains to education; NIL to Net Worth; and Olympic Sports Excellence and Opportunity Fund.

The new deal will extend past when UW is set to go from receiving a half-share in media revenue to a full share when the conference agrees to its new media rights deal after the 2029-30 academic year.

"It's a step (towards helping with NIL)," Chun said. "This university made a critically important strategic decision by joining the Big Ten conference. Entering the Big Ten was with full knowledge that we would go in with half a television share for the first five years. ... We still live in a world where we have a portal opening in January. We don't even know what the rules are just yet. Congress may step in, they may not. So, this is a step. Does not solve our problems by any stretch of the imagination, but it's a positive step and a much-needed step."

With the stadium rights now taken care of for the next decade, the university will likely go to other potential revenue flows to help even the discrepancy in finances between them and other Big Ten rivals.

The team still has the opportunity to earn money in a jersey patch, but that doesn't appear to be close to reaching the finish line.

"It'll be done when it's done," Chun said.

UW's next game at the newly rechristened Columbia Bank Stadium will take place at a to-be-determined time Nov. 21 against the No. 9 Indiana Hoosiers. It will be the Huskies' last home football game of the season.