UM to reward basketball coaches Katie Meier, Jim Larranaga with new contracts

University of Miami basketball coaches Katie Meier and Jim Larranaga will be rewarded with new contracts after their historic NCAA Tournament runs, according to a source with knowledge of the negotiations. The school is finalizing the deals and is expected to announce the news sometime next week.

Larranaga led the men’s team to the first Final Four in school history and Meier led the women to the program’s first Elite Eight. No other school in the nation had both teams in the Elite Eight and only four schools had both teams get as far as the Sweet 16.

Larranaga, who has been at UM for 12 years, signed a two-year contract extension in March of 2022 that takes him through the 2025-26 season. Meier, in her 18^th year at Miami, also agreed to an extension last spring and is under contract through 2026-27.

A Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame nominee, Larranaga made $2.562 million this year, according to the USA Today coaches’ salary database, which ranked eighth among ACC coaches and 48^th among Division 1 coaches.

Tony Bennett of Virginia led ACC coaches at $4.83 million, followed by Jeff Capel of Pittsburgh ($3.61 million), Kenny Payne of Louisville ($3.49 million), Kevin Keatts of N.C. State ($2.8 million), Brad Brownell of Clemson ($2.77 million), Josh Pastner of Georgia Tech ($2.6 million), and Jim Boeheim of Syracuse ($2.58 million). The salaries of Jon Scheyer (Duke) and Earl Grant (Boston College) were not published.

Meier was among six ACC coaches whose salary was not published on the USA Today list. The ACC women’s coach salaries listed ranged from $453,000 for Clemson’s Amanda Butler to $1.52 million for Louisville’s Jeff Walz.

Asked during the NCAA Tournament how long he plans to coach, Larranaga, 73, smiled and replied: “I’m going to coach as long as the University of Miami would like me to be their head coach. I have a contract now. I intend to meet my responsibilities and try to be the best leader and ambassador of the University of Miami, our basketball program, our athletic department and the university as a whole. Whether that’s three, four years, 10 years, I don’t know. I don’t forecast or predict the future. I’m just enjoying my time right now. I live in the present.”

Larranaga has won more than 700 games as a head coach over five decades, won numerous national coach of the year awards, and led the Hurricanes to two Sweet 16s, an Eight Eight and this year the Final Four. Over the past two seasons, UM’s overall record (55-19) was second only to Duke (59-16).

Under Meier’s direction, the Hurricanes have made 10 NCAA Tournament appearances and reached the ACC Tournament final.

Meier, 55, was co-recipient of the 2013 USA Basketball National Coach of the Year award following a 9-0 record and gold medal at the 2013 FIBA U19 World Championship and was inducted into the UM Sports Hall of Fame in 2017. In 2011, she was named the Associated Press National Coach of the Year – sharing the award with Connecticut’s Geno Auriemma and Stanford’s Tara VanDerveer.

Larranaga and Meier discussed their programs’ shared success during an appearance on ESPN’s College GameDay last month.

“I think it speaks volumes to the commitment that the university has made to the athletic department and to our programs; they’ve provided us the resources to be competitive,” said Larranaga. “I think Katie’s done a tremendous job of building the program. She’s had a lot of consistent success and I’m just so proud of my guys for the job they’ve done throughout the season.”

“Like coach said, I think it’s a great platform for us,” Meier said. “I also think just to get both of our programs a little more exposure to see two coaches who love their players, and the players just appreciate the love and have their coaches back… You see that all in both programs.”