• UH hopes to hit the big time with Dana Holgorsen hiring.
With a $20M coach in place, school eyes Power 5 conference
In its continuing pursuit of big-time college athletics, the University of Houston on Thursday unveiled its latest gambit: hiring a big-name football coach, Dana Holgorsen, the $20 million man.
In the last five years, UH has more than $200 million on athletic improvements — among them construction of an on-campus football stadium, indoor practice facility, renovation of Fertitta Center and the Guy V. Lewis Development Center. UH officials hope Holgorsen and a winning team are the final pieces that could entice interest from the highest reaches of the sport, a place within one of the vaunted Power Five conferences.
An invitation to the Big 12, SEC, Big Ten, ACC or Pac-12 would come with a significant financial windfall, not to mention access to college football’s much-debated and controverspent
sial playoff system that is practically not available to UH as a member of the American Athletic Conference.
“Our investment is serious,” UH chancellor and president Renu Khator said during the school’s introduction of Holgorsen as the 15th head football coach in its history.
Holgorsen, a former UH assistant who was the head coach at West Virginia of the Big 12 for the last eight seasons, received a fiveyear deal worth $20 million, the richest deal for any coach in UH history. His yearly salary (not including incentives) ranges from $3.7 million in 2019 to $4.3 million in 2023, according to documents obtained through an openrecords request. Holgorsen’s salary is on par with some of the coaches at top programs in the nation. It more than doubles the $1.75 million paid to former coach Major Applewhite this season.
Add the $4.5 million salary pool that Holgorsen will have at his disposal to hire coaching staff and other support personnel, and UH has committed at least $42.5 million for the next five years, a staggering amount that represents an all-in mentality for a school that has not been in a major conference since the breakup of the Southwest Conference in the mid-1990s.
An increase in booster contributions, season-ticket sales, the higher profile that comes with being among the top conferences — not to mention a few more wins after 7-5 and 8-5 seasons — would put UH’s athletic department on the path to being self-sufficient.
“The university is not going to support the athletic department,” said Tilman Fertitta, a mega-booster and chairman of UH’s board of regents. “We need to be like any serious athletic program, and it needs to operate on its own.”
Rejected by the Big 12 two years ago when the league entertained expansion but opted to stay at 10 schools, Houston is positioning itself as a player if another round of expansion comes to the major conferences.
A key part of any Power Five conference expansion is the league’s television contract and footprint. The Big Ten is first up with its contract expiring after the 2022-23 school year. The Pac-12 is next at 2023-24. Neither has a school in Texas. The Big 12’s contract expires in 2024-25. The SEC (2033-34) and ACC (2035-36) have longer deals in place.
Another factor is a winning football program. The Cougars were 22-4 in Tom Herman’s two seasons, including a Peach Bowl victory over Florida State, but he left for the University of Texas. Applewhite didn’t have the same success in his two seasons, going 15-11. Holgorsen won 10 games twice in his eight seasons at West Virginia, most recently in 2016.
Dr. Mark Nagel, a professor with the College Sport Research Institute at the University of South Carolina, said Houston does not act — nor spend — like a typical non-Power Five school.
“They may already be up to their knees (in athletic spending), so you might as well just get completely in,” Nagel said. “They don’t behave like a lesser Group of Five school. They are spending money and investing in the big sports at a level that, in some cases, exceeds some of the smaller-budgeted Power Five schools.”
Is it worth it? For the calendar year 2017, the University of Texas (Big 12) brought in $214 million and Texas A&M (SEC) $211 million and Texas Tech (Big 12) $88 million. UH athletics generated $57 million. By being left out of the Big 12, it is estimated that UH has lost a chance at more than $450 million.
“There is a three- to four-year window or horizon that’s coming up that there could be some significant changes on how the entire face of college sports look,” Nagel said.
If UH is invited to join a Power Five conference at any time during Holgorsen’s contract, he will receive a $1 million bonus and unspecified salary increase.
For now, though, UH can take some satisfaction in prying Holgorsen away from West Virginia, becoming what is believed to be the first person to leave a Power Five head-coaching job (Big 12) for a Group of Five head-coaching job without being fired or forced out.
Holgorsen, who spent two seasons as offensive coordinator/ quarterbacks coach at UH from 2008-09, opened his remarks Thursday with “it’s great to be home” and then added “this is not a steppingstone” job, an unwanted label for UH with coaching defections by Art Briles (Baylor), Kevin Sumlin (Texas A&M) and Herman (UT) to bigger schools in the past 15 years.
Holgorsen said he cannot control where the Cougars eventually land, if anywhere, in the next cycle of conference movement but he can control the on-field product.
“There’s going to be all kinds of things happen,” Holgorsen said about future realignment. “Our job is to make us as attractive as we possibly can, not only in our current conference, but for what the future holds as well.”
Added Holgorsen: “Make no mistake, we’re here to win championships.”