Mark Stoops’ salary among top 25 in college football

The annual USA Today’s NCAA head coaching salary survey is live, and Kentucky Wildcats’ Mark Stoops cracked the top 25 of the list.

Stoops base salary is $4.75 million with a few other potential bonuses totaling factoring into his overall pay. Those bonuses are likely difficult to reach. For example, they may include winning the SEC, winning 10-plus games or winning a bowl game.

This past season, he did earn over $1 million in bonuses with Kentucky’s first 10-win season in over four decades. The Wildcats also won the Citrus Bowl.

Stoops’ total pay this season is $4.763 million, though it’s unlikely his 3-4 Wildcats will hit any major bonuses in his contract. But the Wildcats were just a field goal away from potentially beating a top-10 Florida team in Week 3. That kick could’ve changed the team’s season and could’ve helped Stoops make a case for a pay raise.

That still won’t stop the long-time Kentucky head coach from being one of the top-25 college head coaches in terms of pay.

Per the USA Today report, Stoops is No. 19, yet isn’t even close to one of the top paid in the Southeastern Conference. Four of the top six coaches come from the SEC with Nick Saban leading the conference with a base pay of just over $8.7 million, almost double Stoops.

As for Stoops, he comes just one rank below Iowa’s Kirk Ferentz and just one rank above Washington’s Chris Peterson. And, with the way he has Kentucky playing the last few seasons, he could get another pay raise in the coming years.