After being hired on March 24 to replace long-time Head Coach Fran McCaffery, Ben McCollum has been busy in Iowa City. It began with his introductory press conference, where he encouraged Iowa fans to be a part of the men's basketball rebuild.
Following his press conference, McCollum began rebuilding the coaching staff and the Iowa roster. McCollum convinced five former Drake coaches to follow him to Iowa and hired an elite recruiter, Luke Barnwell, from Texas Tech.
McCollum dipped heavily into the transfer portal to rebuild the roster. He added five former Drake players, guard Brendan Hausen (Kansas State), and forward Alvaro Folgueiras (Robert Morris) from the transfer portal.
The Hawkeyes were also able to flip a 2025 in-state prospect, Trevin Jirak, from Northern Iowa, and flipped an Oklahoma prospect, Tate Sage, from Drake.
As the coaching staff and roster rounded into form, the public was still unaware of the contract details for their new head coach. On Friday, an open-records request changed that.
Multiple Iowa-based news and sports organizations filed an open-records request to obtain the details of McCollum's contract, including KCCI News, located in Des Moines, Iowa.
The report stated that Iowa signed McCollum to a six-year, 22.7 million dollar contract, not including performance-based incentives. During his first season at the helm (2025-2026), McCollum is set to make 3.3 million, with a base salary of 500,000 and a supplemental income of 2.85 million.
He can also earn 75,000 for winning an NCAA tournament game and 100,000 for a Sweet 16 appearance.
McCollum will have an annual salary pool of 2.1 million to distribute to four assistant coaches.
The contract details also stated what the buyout penalties are for both sides if the contract is terminated early. If McCollum wants to leave before April 1, 2026, he will owe Iowa five million dollars, and that increases by one million every year.
If Iowa wants to fire McCollum without cause within the first three seasons, they would have to pay 80 percent of his annual base salary. That number decreases to 60 percent if Iowa wants to fire him within the final three years of his contract.
Iowa Athletic Director Beth Goetz made a home run hire with Ben McCollum, and they locked him up with a hefty six-year deal.