Coveted $65 million college football coach makes definitive statement on future plans

As schools like LSU, Florida and Penn State — who may be joined in short other by other top programs — cast their first lines in the college football coaching pool, we're getting some clear answers from some of the top candidates.

A guy like Curt Cignetti signed his major contract extension, Matt Rhule signed one and professed his love for Nebraska, even SMU's Rhett Lashlee rallied the Dallas oil barons to pony up and make him a top-10 coach in the sport. Plus, we had Urban Meyer confirm for any dreamers that he's not coming out of retirement to return to Florida.

This week, the latest major college football coach to be asked about his future was Oregon's Dan Lanning. Now, Lanning is very well-entrenched in Eugene with the pipelines and program he's got in place. However, he's an SEC man, and if any jobs could pry him out of the Pacific Northwest, perhaps it's a warmer-climate SEC school with a much friendlier regular season travel schedule. After all, he did become a Duck after his stint as Georgia defensive coordinator.

Alas, his time in the South is in the rear-view, at least for now. When questioned by Rich Eisen whether there's a shot he departs Oregon for one of these new open jobs, he first responded: "Zero." As in, zero shot of him leaving on his own.

"Yeah, I’m not leaving Oregon," he quickly added. "As long as I win. That’s what I always tell my kids, right. If your dad wins, we’ll be at Oregon. So I got to win, right? That’s how it changes."

Dan Lanning's contract extension details

Dan Lanning rocketed up the ranking of current college football coaches with a tremendous three-year start to his head coaching career plus a pretty awesome campaign so far in 2025. Thinking ahead, Oregon also took care of his contract extension this past summer, inking him to a deal with the following structure, according to 247's website, Duck Territory:

Contract Year 4: February 1, 2025-January 31, 2026 - $9.4m + $1m deferral
Contract Year 5: February 1, 2026-January 31, 2027 - $9.6m + $1m deferral
Contract Year 6: February 1, 2027-January 31, 2028 - $9.8m + $1m deferral
Contract Year 7: February 1, 2028- January 31, 2029 - $10.0m + $1m deferral
Contract Year 8: February 1, 2029-January 31, 2030 - $10.2m + $1m deferral
Contract Year 9: February 1, 2030-January 31, 2031 - $10.4m + $1m deferral

That adds up to a grand total of $65.4 million according to the basic language. Of course, there could be incentives and other whatnot tied into it changing the number slightly. But overall, that's about the contract you're looking at for Lanning, which isn't as backbreaking, finanically, as the Cignetti deal or other top contracts but still places Oregon's coach among the highest-paid.