Florida basketball coach Todd Golden has signed a contract extension that raises his annual salary to $6 million, a lucrative bump nearly a month after the Gators won the national championship.
Golden inked a six-year, $40.5 million extension Tuesday, adding a year to his current deal and putting him under contract through the 2030-31 season. He signed a two-year extension in March 2024 that increased his average salary to $4.1 million annually.
His latest raise is a significant commitment from Florida and puts Golden nearly on par with football coach Billy Napier, who is scheduled to make $7.4 million in 2025.
Golden’s deal pays $6 million a year (beginning April 16, 2025), with a $300,000 pay hike every year after.
“Todd has done an incredible job getting Florida men’s basketball back where it belongs,” athletic director Scott Stricklin said in a statement. “We believed in his vision, his competitive nature and his modern approach to the game back in 2022, and he has validated that belief in a relatively short time and helped create memories of a lifetime for another generation of Gator fans.”
The new money makes the 39-year-old Golden the second-highest-paid basketball coach in the Southeastern Conference behind Arkansas’ John Calipari, who earns $8 million annually. Golden, once an assistant under Bruce Pearl at Auburn who got his first head coaching job at San Francisco in 2019, previously ranked 12th out of 16 coaches in the league.
He now jumps to fifth among the seven active coaches with national titles, behind Bill Self of Kansas, Calipari, UConn’s Dan Hurley and Michigan State’s Tom Izzo.
“As we’ve shown during our time in Gainesville, the University of Florida is an institution that has the resources, support, and people in place to compete and win national championships,” Golden said in a statement.
Golden’s new deal is nearly fully guaranteed. Florida would owe him 85% of the remaining value if the school fired him without cause at any point.
Golden’s buyout to leave Gainesville starts at $16 million next season and drops annually: $11 million in 2026-27; $4 million in 2027-28; $3 million in 2028-29; $2 million in 2029-30; and $1 million in 2030-31.
However, Golden can leave for the NBA at a much lower price. His NBA buyout begins at $3 million next season and drops to $2 million (2026-28) and then $1 million in 2028-29.
Included in Golden’s annual compensation is a $500,000 signing bonus, a $500,000 annual longevity incentive and a $60,000 annual expense account. In addition to that, he gets $70,000 annually in travel allowance for using the university athletic association’s plane and other fringe benefits valued at $62,000.
He would get a $100,000 bonus for winning the SEC regular-season championship, a $50,000 bonus for winning the SEC Tournament, a $100,000 bonus for making the NCAA Tournament and a $50,000 bonus for every NCAA Tournament victory.
With Golden at the helm for his third season in Gainesville, the Gators finished 36-4 and beat Houston to clinch the program’s third national title. They won their final 12 games, including four in the NCAA Tournament in come-from-behind fashion.
Florida’s style of play under Golden has drawn rave reviews, leading to sellouts in eight of the team’s last 10 home games. Florida averaged 84.8 points a game this season after setting the program record (85.6) during the 2023-24 campaign.
Golden became the third coach this century to win a national title within his first three seasons on the job, joining North Carolina’s Roy Williams (2005) and UConn’s Kevin Ollie (2014). Williams and Ollie accomplished the feat in their second seasons.
Golden has a modest rebuild on his hands now. Leading scorer Walter Clayton, the Final Four’s Most Outstanding Player, is headed to the NBA along with fellow guards Alijah Martin and Will Richard. Forwards Alex Condon and Rueben Chinyelu are going through the NBA draft process with the potential to stay in school and return for next season.
Backup guard Denzel Aberdeen (Kentucky) and backup forward Sam Alexis (Indiana) transferred, and assistant coaches Kevin Hovde (Columbia) and John Andrzejek (Campbell) took head coaching jobs.
Golden signed two guards out of the transfer portal — Princeton’s Xaivian Lee and Ohio’s AJ Brown — and have swingman CJ Ingram and guard Alex Lloyd joining the team as incoming freshmen.
Reporting by The Associated Press.
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