I don't know if it was a grad who made the gift or not. Didn't see that in the article. Could have been. Reasonable assumption anyway.
Nevertheless, I don't really see much of a connection between their academics and this gift to the athletic department. If a good education was directly linked athletic department gifts, Ivy League schools should be killing it.
Really big athletic giving requires alumni bases with two things:
1) Deep pockets - this can be accomplished by having a few _really_ deep ones, or a whole lot of just deep ones.
2) Obsession about the college teams.
The Ivy League Schools certainly have plenty of deep pockets among their alumni. But those folks aren't particularly obsessed with their schools' athletic success (they do give HUGE amounts to academic programs, however).
On the other hand, you have schools like Clemson and Alabama (and many others) who have plenty of sports-obsessed fans. And while they will pay every last dime they have to succeed on the court or field, they don't have a limitless amount of dimes.
Then, you have those relative few programs (Texas, A&M, Michigan, etc) that have everything. They have a plenty of deep-pocketed sports-obsessed fans who are willing to write really big checks to enjoy their Saturday afternoons.
Missouri isn't in the same class financially as Texas and Texas A&M, but as the only flagship state university in a state with two large metropolitan areas, it's fair to assume that Mizzou's alumni base isn't hurting for money. And it sounds like at least one of them has developed an obsession about Mizzou athletics.
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