AuburnFamilyNews.com: Kirby Smart gets contract extension through 2024, will earn $7 million per year

Thursday, May 3, 2018

Kirby Smart gets contract extension through 2024, will earn $7 million per year


Georgia football coach Kirby Smart got a three-year contract extension and a massive raise Thursday, a deal that will keep him at his alma mater through at least 2024 and pay him $7 million per year.

The 42-year-old Smart is 21-7 in two seasons at Georgia, his first head-coaching stop. He led the Bulldogs to a 13-2 record and the SEC title in 2017 before losing to Alabama in overtime in the College Football Playoff National Championship Game, earning SEC Coach of the Year honors.

"Kirby has provided an incredible level of energy and excitement to our football program, and we look forward to his leadership for many years to come," Georgia athletics director Greg McGarity said.

Smart had been under contract through 2021 at approximately $3.75 million per season. He joins Alabama's Nick Saban, Clemson's Dabo Swinney, Michigan's Jim Harbaugh and Texas A&M's Jimbo Fisher in the $7 million per year club among college football coaches (Kentucky basketball coach John Calipari is also in that rarified company).

Smart was an Alabama assistant coach from 2008-15, moving to defensive coordinator after his first season in Tuscaloosa. He helped the Crimson Tide to national championships after the 2009, 2011, 2012 and 2015 seasons before replacing the fired Mark Richt at Georgia, where he played safety in the late 1990s.

"As a young boy, I grew up in this great state dreaming of being a Bulldog," Smart said. "To have been able to do that--first as a player, and now as the head football coach--is beyond anything I ever dreamed.  I do not take lightly the awesome responsibility of leading this program, and while I'm pleased with where we are as a program, I couldn't be more excited about where we're going in the future.  You can rest assured that we will continue to work tirelessly to make Georgia football the best it can possibly be."



from Auburn Sports Impact http://www.al.com/sports/index.ssf/2018/05/kirby_smart_gets_contract_exte.html

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