Florida men’s basketball coach Todd Golden has a new contract just weeks after the Gators won the national title.
Golden has agreed to a new six-year deal with Florida through the 2030-31 season. Golden will become one of the highest-paid coaches in college basketball with the new contract worth just over $40 million.
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That will be a significant raise for the 39-year-old after he was the 34th-highest paid coach last season according to USA Today’s database. Golden made $3.6 million a season ago — less than half of what Kansas coach Bill Self made. Self, the highest-paid coach in college basketball, had a salary of $8.8 million.
Golden was the 12th-highest paid coach in the SEC a season ago. His salary was $10,000 less than Georgia coach Mike White, the man who preceded Golden at Florida. His salary for the 2025-26 season is set to be approximately $6 million. That would have placed Golden sixth among all coaches a season ago.
“Todd has done an incredible job getting Florida men’s basketball back where it belongs,” Florida athletic director Scott Stricklin said in a statement. “We believed in his vision, his competitive nature and his modern approach to the game back in 2022, and he has validated that belief in a relatively short time and helped create memories of a lifetime for another generation of Gator fans.”
Golden came to Florida from San Francisco ahead of the 2022-23 season. After Florida won 16 games in his first season, the Gators won 24 games in 2023-24 and made a 12-win jump this past season. Florida went 36-4 in 2024-25 as the Gators won their final 12 games of the season. After losing not he road to Georgia, Florida won its final three regular-season games of the year before winning all three of its SEC tournament games by at least nine points.
That SEC tournament win helped the Gators earn a No. 1 seed in the NCAA tournament and Florida snuck past two-time defending national champion UConn in the second round to get to the Sweet 16. An 84-79 win over Texas Tech put the Gators in the Final Four and they took down Auburn in the semifinals before beating Houston 65-63 to win the school’s first men’s basketball title since 2007.
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During the season, Golden was accused by multiple women of sexual harassment. However, Florida said in January that there was “no evidence” that Golden violated the school’s Title IX policies and closed the investigation into the allegations.
Florida will look significantly different as it looks to defend its national title in 2025-26. Star Walter Clayton Jr. is gone along with Alijah Martin, Will Richard and Denzel Aberdeen, among others. The Gators do bring back Thomas Haugh and Rueben Chinyelu while Alex Condon could also return to school. Condon is officially weighing a decision to declare for the NBA Draft. The Gators have also added Ohio’s AJ Brown and Princeton’s Xaivian Lee in the transfer portal and have commitments from a pair of four-star guards out of high school in CJ Ingram and Alex Lloyd.
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