Canzano: Oregon Ducks extend Dan Lanning's contract

New deal runs through 2028.

Dan Lanning went 10-3 in his first season. (Photo: Serena Morones)

The University of Oregon extended the contract of football coach Dan Lanning, per a source. The new deal will run through the 2028 season and give him a bump in salary. It will ensure the stability of the football program.

That said, my first thought wasn’t football.

I thought instead about his wife, Sauphia, and their three kids.

Lanning, 37, moved them all around the country over the last decade. Before coming to Eugene last year his family received its mail at zip codes in Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, Texas and Arizona.

When Lanning was hired by Oregon in 2022 nobody on campus thought “there’s our forever guy.” But I had a conversation with his father, Don, shortly after the hire that made me wonder if UO’s coach might stick around for a while.

Both of Lanning’s parents were public school teachers. The football coach’s father told me over the summer: “Daniel is loyal to a fault. I can promise you that he is planning on serving every minute of his contract and beyond. He’s not primarily motivated by money.”

Willie Taggart left Oregon after just one season.

Mario Cristobal lasted four years before bolting to Miami.

I received an email from a father in Eugene not long after that Taggart-Cristobal spin cycle telling me that his children had befriended Cristobal’s kids in elementary school. The program wasn’t just losing a coach. The kids lost good friends.

There are things bigger than football, see?

Dan and Sauphia Lanning and their children.

Lanning made $4.7 million in base salary last season, good for No. 32 nationally. His raise and contract extension will put him in the Top 15-20 range, per a source. By my math that puts him somewhere north of Chip Kelly’s (No. 20) $5.6 million a year and south of Kentucky coach Mark Stoops ($6.75 million).

Forever guy?

One of the Pac-12 sports information directors cracked me up recently when he told me that his long-time football coach pulled him aside and offered “I know you are with me win — or win.”

Such is the business of major college football. Lanning has only coached one season. He went 10-3 last season. Two of those losses came to his rival schools, Washington and Oregon State. There was a Holiday Bowl victory in there, too.

UO athletic director Rob Mullens must see something he really likes. Maybe it’s the good energy. Maybe it’s the promise of stability. Maybe it’s both of those things, combined with Lanning’s superb recruiting class.

Football is big business in college athletics. The Ducks are focused on mattering on the national stage. Not just for mega-booster Phil Knight, but for itself, too.

The program has 10-win momentum.

Lanning has some additional job security.

Still, it’s that wife and his children I first thought about when I heard the news. The Lanning family gets to settle in, make friends, and stick around for a while.

That feels big, too.

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