SUMMARY
- Chris Holtmann coached the Ohio State Buckeyes for seven seasons before being dismissed in 2024.
- The veteran earned an annual compensation of $3.8 million.
Chris Holtmann has held an influential role in the basketball community for several years now. He has won multiple accolades as a coach such as Big East (2013), Big South (2017), and Big Ten (2018) Coach of the Year. Overall, Holtmann has made multiple trips to the NCAA Tournament. However, he has never been able to win a title for either of the programs that he has coached before.
The 52-year-old signed with Ohio State University in 2017 after initially rejecting Ohio’s Athletics Director, Gene Smith’s offer. There he was offered a multi-year deal that was valid through the 2024-25 season. However, the Ohio State Buckeyes never necessarily achieved much success after the first five seasons he coached. Over the last two seasons, Ohio State has struggled to maintain a record above .500 on multiple occasions.
Coming into the 2023-24 season, Holtmann found himself in a fix as the Buckeyes achieved a losing 4-10 home record. Additionally, they were 0-7 on the road under his guidance through the 2023-24 campaign. Things were so out of hand that Ohio State’s student newspaper called the men’s basketball team “a corpse of a program”, urging the institution to sack him.
Chris Holtmann earned an annual salary of $3.8 million with the Buckeyes
Chris Holtmann’s journey as a coach began in 1998 at Geneva University. In 1999, he shifted base to Taylor University and then Garner-Webb in 2003. During all three stints, he served as an assistant coach. It was 2010 when Holtmann got his first gig as a head coach at Garner-Webb. Before this, he briefly served as an assistant coach at Ohio State.
After coaching Garner-Webb for three years, the veteran coach signed a deal with Butler University in 2013, as an assistant. Eventually, became the head coach in 2014 and he went on to have a fairly decent stint. After three years at Butler, he received a call from Ohio State’s Gene Smith.
Chris Holtmann eventually joined to lead the Buckeyes and he was paid an average of $3.8 million per season with a base salary of $850,000. The exact worth of his contract was never revealed besides the fact that it was a multi-year agreement. This salary that was given to him included aggregate media payments as well.
Chris Holtmann signed an extension to coach the Buckeyes until 2028
The first five seasons of his stint at Ohio State were decent, except for the fact that the Buckeyes could never get past the second round of the NCAA Tournament. It was when the Buckeyes lost against a lower-ranked Oral Roberts during the 2021 NCAA campaign that people started to notice Chris Holtmann’s inadequacies.
In 2022, Ohio State decided to offer Chris an extension which was valid up to the 2027-28 season. Holtmann’s existing contract was set to expire in 2025 after which the extension would have come into place. His annual compensation was set to be $3.5 million with a boost in base salary to $1 million. The aggregate media payments were also boosted from $1,365,000 to $1,665,000.
By firing Chris Holtmann, Ohio State will owe him a buyout of about $14 million to no longer coach the Buckeyes’ basketball team. pic.twitter.com/NEtV4RToyf
— Front Office Sports (@FOS) February 14, 2024
Unfortunately, Holtmann never got the opportunity to fulfill that contract as the Buckeyes decided to dismiss him. They agreed to buy out his contract for $14 million following his dismissal. Holtmann’s run was a little underwhelming but worse towards the end.