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'A contract provides stability' — UNC commits to coaches

Five national championship-winning coaches — Anson Dorrance (women’s soccer), Joe Breschi (men’s lacrosse), Sam Paul (men’s tennis), Karen Shelton (field hockey) and Carlos Somoano (men’s soccer) — signed their first multi-year contract. Each continues through the 2018-2019 season.

Women’s lacrosse coach Jenny Levy agreed to a one-year contract extension through 2018-19, and women’s basketball coach Sylvia Hatchell agreed to a two-year extension through 2019-20.

Bubba Cunningham, director of athletics, said most Division I athletic programs now offer coaches multi-year contracts, but UNC only recently adopted this model.

“Most of our peers in our league have multi-year contracts,” he said. “We’re probably a few years behind the norm.”

Cunningham said this was one of his goals when he arrived at UNC.

“I started with the national championship coaches,” he said. “I felt like they were the most deserving to get the first few contracts and now we’ll get to the other coaches.”

He said two-thirds of head coaches now have contracts and he hopes to provide contracts for the rest of the coaches soon. He will recommend new contracts and extensions to the Board of Trustees in November.

Dorrance said he feels grateful to Cunningham and the athletic department.

“It’s the first contract I’ve ever been given,” he said. “It was overwhelming because I have never pretended like I ever wanted to leave this place and I’ve never pretended that I felt I needed an enormous contract in order to work here.”

Sports law professor Barbara Osborne said multi-year contracts show commitment to coaches.

“A contract provides stability,” she said. “It’s a promise from the institution that we want to keep you around.”

She said athletic departments also use contracts to deter coaches from going to other programs.

Hatchell’s contract went through 2018 originally, but after speculation that the athletic department did not support her, Cunningham extended it.

“There were some issues in the basketball program that I was concerned about and I asked her to address those and she has,” Cunningham said. “So then I made a decision to recommend an extension to the board, which they approved.”

While some Olympic sports coaches are now getting contracts, football and men’s basketball head coaches have historically had multi-year contracts.

Head football coach Larry Fedora received a seven-year contract extension at the end of the 2015-16 season.

“We were coming off a great season, and I don’t know if I expected it, but I knew it was going on, I knew they were talking,” he said.

He said his representatives worked with Cunningham and the athletic department to come to an agreement.

“I trust Bubba and the administration to make good decisions and I trust my representatives to protect me,” he said.

university@dailytarheel.com

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