Last December, Iowa State head football coach Matt Campbell signed a contract extension, but details weren’t really known until today when it was announced that he’ll be making $5 million per year until 2032. However, the length and money isn’t the important part.
Iowa State and coach Matt Campbell have finalized his extension through 2032. He’ll earn $5 million per year in total compensation. The 3x Big 12 Coach of the Year took a discount on the deal to ensure his staff pool increased and allowed
ADISU to allocate an additional $1 million… pic.twitter.com/saFP61iksO
— Max Olson (@max_olson) August 1, 2025
Per the tweet immediately above this sentence, Campbell is reportedly taking this contract at a discount in order to free up $1 million in the budget for Iowa State to dedicate to revenue sharing in football. Nobody that knows any modicum of ball about college football should be under the impression at this point that Campbell is in it for the money or is simply using Iowa State as a stepping stone to bigger things, but his decision to reduce his own pay specifically to help pay his players and ease some financial burden on the athletic department to cover costs associated with revenue sharing should silence any remaining doubt that Campbell is in Ames for the foreseeable future.
Jamie Pollard has made no bones about the potential future struggles for both Iowa State and Iowa as it relates to revenue sharing and covering a brand new $21 million yearly line item that simply didn’t exist two months ago.
The easiest solution to those issues going forward may be the Iowa Board of Regents earmarking the full revenue sharing item for the schools in their yearly budget and not forcing the athletic departments to pay out of pocket (especially since multiple other states have already elected to do that), but that will require the repealing of a state law preventing the BOR from funding athletics in any way.
In the meantime, Iowa State keeping its superstar head coach in town for at least the next eight years and keeping the Cyclones nationally relevant on a yearly basis is the single best thing it can do on its own at this point in time.
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