Iona basketball coach Rick Pitino has the Gaels (20–7) sitting atop the MAAC with the league’s tournament slated to begin in less than two weeks at Jim Whelan Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City.
But as Pitino prepares to lead Iona to a second consecutive regular-season title with aspirations of securing a second conference tournament championship in March and an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament, his coaching future in college basketball has become a hot topic.
In the coming weeks, several high-profile coaching opportunities are slated to become vacant, including potential Big East jobs like Georgetown and St. John’s, among others. However, even as higher-tier programs emerge, Pitino told Matt Norlander of CBS Sports that it would take a “really special” program to lure him away from Iona.
“It would have to be someplace really, really special with the type of president that I have here," Pitino said. “If I wanted to leave, it would be a job that I thought could get to a Final Four.”
Specifically, Pitino said there are “20 to 30 states where I don’t want to live,” a list that includes many Big Ten states, per CBS Sports.
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In November, the Independent Review Panel of the Independent Accountability Resolution Process exonerated Pitino, saying that he did not commit a violation and that he “demonstrated an atmosphere of compliance in Louisville’s pay-for-play NCAA scandal. But in October, a few weeks prior to the IARP clearing Pitino, he was seeking a lifetime contract extension at Iona.
However, the extensions did not work out for a “variety of reasons.”
“I’m not upset, and nobody’s upset about it,” Pitino previously said ahead of the 2022 season. “… There was a changing of the guard with the Board of Trustees and a few other things that didn’t work out with the contract, so it’s no hard feelings and we just try to have a great team this year.”
Currently, Pitino has three years remaining on his current contract that reportedly pays him in a high six-figure range. But more importantly, Pitino had a buyout on his deal worth millions, something that played a part in preventing him from leaving for a job at a bigger program.
Pitino was offered three jobs that included one “big-time job,” which CBS Sports reports was the opening at Maryland. His buyout was a key reason why he did not move forward in the process.
“... I told the one job, it was a big-time job, I said, ‘Look, I’ve got a $5 million buyout. I had $10 million prior to that. I’m not worth that,’” Pitino said, per CBS Sports.
Maryland ended up hiring Kevin Willard, a former Gaels coach and friend to Pitino. But, the longtime basketball coach took steps to expand his coaching possibilities when he met with Iona president Seamus Carey, who eliminated his buyout last offseason.
With no buyout, Pitino’s name will likely float among different programs seeking to find their next head coach, despite the baggage and controversy surrounding his college basketball coaching career.
