Nebraska women’s coach Yori to earn $660,000 a year under contract extension through 2014-15

Nebraska’s Yori gets 3-year contract extension

LINCOLN, Neb. — Nebraska coach Connie Yori, who led the Cornhuskers to the best season in program history, has received a three-year contract extension that will pay her $660,000 a year through the 2014-15 season.

Yori was The Associated Press national coach of the year and Big 12 coach of the year after the Huskers won their first 30 games and finished 32-2. The Huskers won their first Big 12 regular-season championship and reached the NCAA regional semifinals.

Yori previously earned a base salary of $234,455, with outside deals raising that figure to $384,455.

The salary figure announced Friday includes the outside income, associate athletic director Marc Boehm said.

With the 73 percent raise, Yori’s salary ranks No. 6 among Big 12 coaches. The only league coaches paid less than Yori last season were Colorado’s Kathy McConnell-Miller, who was fired, and Missouri’s Cindy Stein, who resigned.

“We feel this puts her in the very top half within the conference and we feel that’s very fair,” Boehm said. “We want Connie here for a very long time.”

Bonus incentives for winning the conference and advancing in the NCAA tournament remain the same. She earned more than $75,000 in bonuses last season.

Yori, who was out of town, said in a statement that she appreciated the support of athletic director Tom Osborne, Boehm and the rest of the administration.

“Winning in the Big 12 Conference brings great challenges every night, but we have proven that we can succeed,” Yori said. “Hopefully we can build on that success over the next few years.”

The Huskers, led by All-American Kelsey Griffin, were the surprise of the women’s game last season. They were picked sixth in the Big 12 preseason poll but went 16-0 in league play and won 30 straight before they lost to Texas A&M in the conference tournament semifinals.

Nebraska earned its first No. 1 seed in the NCAA tournament and beat Northern Iowa and UCLA before losing to Kentucky in the Sweet 16.

Nebraska’s 32 wins were 17 more than in 2008-09.

“Connie has been steadily building our women’s basketball program at Nebraska over the past eight seasons, and last year the team achieved at the highest levels of any team in our history,” Osborne said. “She has not only consistently won basketball games and led our team to the postseason, but the young women in our program have done well academically and demonstrated high character.”

Nebraska ranked seventh nationally in women’s basketball attendance last season, averaging 7,390 a game. The Huskers’ average of 11,383 for Big 12 home games led the league.

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University of Nebraska-Lincoln athletics: www.huskers.com