'He's Not Going Anywhere': Nate Oats Signs Contract Extension with Alabama

Alabama men's basketball head coach Nate Oats signed a contract extension on Sunday, per Yea Alabama, the school's NIL collective.

The new deal will run through the 2031-32 season, per CBS Sports' Jon Rothstein.

"Nate Oats has signed a new contract that will make him one of the top five compensated men’s basketball coaches in the country," Alabama athletic director Greg Byrne wrote in a statement. "Appropriate members of The Board of Trustees have been notified of the proposed terms of the new agreement and it will soon be formally approved through the Board process. "

Byrne announced that the deal was done on March 28, but the statement above wasn't made until Sunday.

"We are good! He’s not going anywhere!" Byrne wrote on X (formerly known as Twitter) on March 28.

Oats' extension was expected to come in the near future, as he received his last one a couple of weeks before the Crimson Tide's Final Four run during the 2023-24 season. He was asked about the negotiations on March 26 — the day before Alabama's loss to Michigan in the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Tournament.

Oats mentioned that there were discussions, but he did not have an official offer in hand. Nevertheless, he emphasized that a new deal didn't need to be "a huge rush" to accomplish, as he enjoys the "really good contract that I've got right now." This mindset goes back to well before he was the Crimson Tide's head coach.

"Listen, I say this a lot — I am a high school coach that caught a couple breaks in life, and there's probably high school coaches better than me out there that just didn't get the breaks," Oats said before facing Michigan. "As a matter of fact, I know there's high school coaches better than me.

"When my salary goes up a half million dollars every year — you know how long it took me to make a half million dollars at Romulus [High School]? I got paid 4,700 a year to coach basketball for 11 years. So I'm not going to them asking them to redo — we redid the contract and I went to a Final Four. And we didn't redo it, because they got good faith in me and I got good faith in them.

"We've had discussions. I'm open to redoing them. But I'm not really looking to leave. I'm pretty honest with them. If they come up with one that makes sense to do, it's good. I'd love to stay there (Alabama). But I'm not really looking [elsewhere]."

The aforementioned Final Four appearance from two years ago was Alabama's first in program history. This past weekend was Oats' fourth straight Sweet 16 appearance. The only other teams that have reached the third round of the NCAA Tournament that many times in a row are Houston and Tennessee.

Also since his last extension, Oats has acquired UA's most NCAA Tournament wins and victories over AP Top 25 opponents. Additionally, the Crimson Tide has had an AP All-American on its roster five times during Oats' tenure. Alabama accomplished this just eight times before Oats' arrival.

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