Arizona coach Tommy Lloyd said Friday that everyone at U of Arizona needed to be in alignment over the men’s basketball program, and a newly obtained contract shows how far the university is going to make that happen. The five-year deal, approved by the Arizona Board of Regents on April 16 and worth $37.5 million through 2030-31, gives University of Arizona President Suresh Garimella exclusive authority over Lloyd’s performance and financial matters.
Under the contract, Garimella will directly evaluate Lloyd’s job performance, compensation, operating budget and NIL roster budget, while working with athletic director Desireé Reed-Francois and UA chief financial officer John Arnold. A UA spokesman, Mitch Zak, said Lloyd would continue to report to Reed-Francois. The new language is notable because Lloyd’s previous contract, agreed to in April 2025, said he would report directly to the athletic director, with additional oversight by the president of the university.
The change lands at a moment when college basketball money is moving quickly. Since the House settlement in June 2025, schools have been allowed to pay athletes up to $20.5 million across all sports, and they can also raise outside NIL funds for extra compensation. For Arizona, the combined revenue-sharing and outside-paid NIL money was reportedly about $10 million for men’s basketball in 2025-26, though the university will not release how much it gave the program.
Section 1.1 of Lloyd’s new contract says Garimella will oversee the budget for compensation for the university or its approved third-party entities to student-athletes tied to their name, image and likeness. A clause titled NIL/Revenue-Sharing and Budget Commitment says all parties agreed that UA men’s basketball would be supported so it is competitive nationally. That language is unusual in college athletics, and it arrives after Arizona gained leverage during the NCAA Tournament and amid reports of interest from North Carolina in its coaching vacancy.
The result is a contract that does more than pay Lloyd. It makes clear that Arizona wants one chain of command, one budget picture and one standard for success, even if that structure is far more hands-on than what most programs use.