Well the latter isn't really true, because Universities have been cancelling collegiate sports programs long before the pandemic hit, mostly because even sports that have spectators may not draw enough revenue to offset the costs of running those sports.
The pandemic was mostly just a convenient "excuse" (probably bad word choice, but you get the point) for Universities to finally terminate sports programs that have been losing money for a long time. Previously, people would push back against them, and tell them they could use football money or basketball money to fund womens field hockey or whatever sport it was that cost more to operate than the revenue they took in. Now, when football and basketball revenue's plummet, they can more easily justify closing said programs.
There's also Universities that still have sports programs that don't have spectators or TV, and continue to have people seek and actively participate in such, despite being a money loser for the University.
If you want to be totally conceptual about it, Colleges/Universities are somewhat exempt from this model, because they can not only generate revenue from the act of the person playing the sport, but they can also generate revenue from the mere presence of that person being on campus, i.e. paying tuition. Those funds don't necessarily end up in the same revenue/cost pools as one another, but its a bit different than a Pro Sports league, where the athletes are paid and the only real source of income from those athletes is based on what they do on their corresponding fields/courts, etc.
Universities frequently fund loss leaders because, if they were to close the womens field hockey program, there may be a few dozen women who opt not to go to that school anymore, and therefore they've lost potential tuition, fees, etc. from those students.
