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The University of Mississippi Athletics
Boone Announces Contract Extension For Nutt
12/5/2008 | Football
OXFORD, Miss. - Ole Miss Athletics Director Pete Boone announced Friday that he and head football coach Houston Nutt have agreed in principle to an extension to Nutt’s current contract.
Nutt’s existing four-year deal will be extended until 2012.
Boone said he will now forward his recommendation for the contract extension to the Board of Trustees, State Institutions of Higher Learning as well as to the UMAA Foundation Board of Directors for their approval.
“Under Houston Nutt’s leadership, the Ole Miss football program is returning to a position of national prominence,” Boone said. “The quality of his assistant coaches and his ability to motivate are essential tools to having a successful program. Over the next few years, we expect to see significant results from the foundation which has been built this year.”
“I’m very excited about the terms we discussed,” Nutt said. “I’m excited about the assistant coaches' salaries, and I’m excited about the vision Pete Boone has. This helps our recruiting and shows the direction our program is headed. We are very excited about going to our bowl game.”
“The Ole Miss community is excited about the football program and the leadership Coach Nutt has provided,” said Ole Miss Chancellor Robert Khayat. “I commend Pete Boone and Coach Nutt for their commitment to the long-term success of the program. All of us celebrate the wonderful year we have had and are looking forward to the bowl game. Since 1995, one of our major goals has been to have a competitive, integrity-based athletics program. We have attained that in football, as well as in other sports.”
In his first season in
With an 8-4 regular-season record and a 5-3 mark in the SEC, Nutt led one of the greatest turnarounds in school history, reviving a Rebel squad that was coming off four straight losing seasons and a 3-8 campaign with no conference wins in 2007. It marked the team’s best improvement from one season to the next since legendary Ole Miss Coach John Vaught’s debut in 1947.
Projected to place fifth in the SEC Western Division in the preseason, Nutt’s Rebels finished second in the West, knocked off the last two national champions on the road in No. 4 Florida and No. 18 LSU and ended the year on a five-game win streak.