The salaries of big-time college athletic coaches’ salaries continue to balloon, and it’s no different with college basketball.
Ohio State may not be known for being as much of a basketball school compared to a rabid and highly successful football one, but when you start looking at what the basketball program has accomplished over the years, there are many universities that would love to have accomplished some of the things OSU has.
On top of that, the Ohio State athletic department is a very competitive one and has no problem paying its coaches to be among the best.
So maybe it’s a bit surprising then (or not) that Chris Holtmann is not paid among the top tier of college basketball coaches. USA TODAY tracks these types of things, and according to figures it has obtained, Holtmann is just the 26th highest-paid coach in all of college basketball.
Not surprisingly, Kentucky’s John Calipari leads the list with an annual base salary of $8 million, followed closely by Mike Krzyzewski of Duke with a base compensation of $7,256,924.
John Calipari and Mike Krzyzewski top the list of highest-paid men's basketball coaches. https://t.co/s4NvciuQlG
— USA TODAY Sports (@usatodaysports) March 12, 2020
Only two Big Ten coaches make more than Holtmann, and include Michigan State’s Tom Izzo ($3,743,070) and Archie Miller of Indiana ($3.3 million).
So really, Holtmann is kind of right where you’d expect him to be in the conference. But clearly, the Big Ten lags behind some of the other big-time programs out there.