I disagree. It's because of the massive amounts of money in the CF market that makes the coaching salaries and facilities race possible. Programs that pay high salaries all still make money. They can't pay the players directly, so they "pay" them in perks. Some coaches are beneficiaries also.
A parallel issue would be the rise college costs/tuition. Most (even government) economists believe that college costs rose at such a steep level over the years due to the flood of cheap/free money from the federal loan program. To put it simply, college costs (coaches salaries, player facilities) rose so fast and far because they could...the money was there. Economics 101.
A lot of the sports money is coming from TV contracts that were made years ago. The entire landscape of cable and networks is changing and the money will change right along with it. Nothing keeps going straight up without some repercussions along the way. Exactly how many of these colleges do you think are making the big bucks to support all of their sports teams. They still rely on donations for buildings and major projects.
I saw first had what happens at colleges when they get things "given" to them by donors or the taxpayers. We went through this years ago here in KS where K-State was screaming about not being able to repair things. Well, it is easy to get Joe Blow to donate 5 Million to build a building with his name on it but now who is going to keep the HVAC and other maintenance items up? You guessed it, the taxpayers. People don't donate for basic things. Take a school like KU, they put their millions in a BB coach, not a FB coach, there is only so much to go around.
Yes, the influx of student loans has been going on for many years, even when I was young. People borrow it like they never will have to pay it back and colleges have to offer luxurious dorms, spas and other nice things to get people to come to their colleges. That is what happened. The learning certainly didn't improve but parents wanted Johnny to have nice things during his 6 years of undergrad work.
It simply can't go on forever. The spread between the haves and have nots will continue to expand. That is a law of economics, always has been that way, no different in colleges. If you look around the country you will find a bunch of U's that are struggling and have since the 2008 financial crisis. Throw in the fewer numbers of students and plethora of colleges all over and things look dicey in that game.