I filed a FOIA request with the University of Virginia to find out if the school did right by Ron Sanchez in terms of compensation for his season as the interim basketball coach.
They did.
Somewhat.
Per a memorandum of understanding signed on Oct. 31, Sanchez was to be paid $1.125 million to serve as the interim coach for the 2024-2025 season, for a six-month term running from Oct. 31-April 30.
This figure is derived from an annualized $500,000 in base salary, $1 million in supplemental compensation and $750,000 in licensing compensation, which would come to $2.25 million for a full-year term, as set out in the terms of the MOU.
The Daily Progress reported back in December that the UVA Freedom of Information Act Office had answered a public-records request on Sanchez’s contract status with a statement that “no new contract has been executed” for Sanchez, “but his new annual salary is $1,509,000.”
Gotta do some math here.
With his employment year having started on April 30, Sanchez would have already been compensated for six months of work as an assistant for the 2024-2025 sports year, for which he would have been paid $225,000 – based on his annualized $200,000 in base pay and $250,000 in supplemental compensation.
There was also a $9,000 annualized car allowance in the assistant contract that we can assume carried over to the MOU.
I get the total compensation for his six months as an assistant coach and the six months as the interim head coach at $1.384 million.
I’m missing $125,000 in my accounting … somewhere.
I’m thinking maybe there could have been an overlap for his last pay period as an assistant and the beginning of the contract to serve as the interim.
Whichever figure is accurate, it was a bump up in pay for Sanchez, though also at a discount rate for UVA Athletics.
The annualized compensation of $2.25 million for Sanchez stands against the compensation for the former head coach, Tony Bennett, who stepped down on Oct. 18.
Bennett’s total compensation was set at $4,020,287 under the terms of the five-year extension that he signed in June.
The $2.25 million compensation package offered to Sanchez would seem to set the floor in terms of compensation for the next head coach.
Sanchez was able to snag that annualized rate as a head coach with a career record of 72-78 in his five-year stint at Charlotte, from 2018-2023, where his final total compensation came in at $650,000 a year.
ICYMI
The reported top candidate for the open UVA job, Ryan Odom, is currently being paid $1,812,375 at VCU.
Odom is 222-126 in 11 seasons as a head coach at five different stops, including, coincidentally, an interim stint at Charlotte, back in 2015.
Another reported finalist for the UVA job, Shaka Smart, is being paid $3,040,784 at Marquette.
Smart is 370-182 in 16 seasons as a head coach at three stops, including, coincidentally, VCU.
A third finalist, Iowa State coach TJ Otzelberger, just signed an extension in December that increases his annual total compensation to $4 million per year, a smidge under what UVA was paying Bennett.
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Chris Graham
