Official practices have started, which means we’re getting ready to unveil our updated coaching salary database for the new competition season. It’s always striking to see salary disparities across conferences, and to see a lag between increased performance and raises. Keep in mind that coaches live in places with wildly varying cost of living: for example, Seattle is a lot pricier than Champaign.
We rounded up four coaches who we think have earned a raise, and two who recently cashed in on their successes.
Note that all contracts are structured slightly differently. For the purposes of this piece we only considered base salary, since benefits vary widely.
Jenny Hansen, Minnesota
2023-2024 salary: $120,000
At a glance, Hansen’s salary looks solid. Consider, though, that she lives in a large metro area, and has coached her team to great success. Her recruiting has been stellar (Lexy Ramler and Mya Hooten, anyone?) and she led her squad to the national championships in 2022 for the first time since 2013. Her contract states, “salary increases for contract years three through
five [2023-2025] shall be made at the discretion of the AD.” All eyes on Mark Coyle, but since he cut the legendary men’s program we’re not holding our breath.
