Brad Brownell confirms he is nearing contract extension with Clemson

Clemson’s Brad Brownell has already had his name come up in coaching searches coming towards the end of this season. The only deal it sounds like he’ll be signing, though, will be one that’ll keep him with the Tigers.

Speaking to the media yesterday in Providence ahead of their game in the NCAA Tournament, Brownell addressed his reported extension, per the likes of Jon Rothstein, with Clemson. He confirmed they’ve been working towards that with something coming for him to remain at Clemson.

“Yeah, um, very close to ironing it out,” said Brownell. “Um, you know, extremely grateful. I’ve had a bunch of meetings with Graham, really. As the regular season was kind of coming to an end that last week, he got with me and we started to have some conversations, preliminary conversations. Certainly, they’ve heated up over the last week or so and it’s been really good.”

“We’re, you know, close to being able to, to finalize something,” said Brownell.

Again, this comes after Brownell had been connected to other jobs in the sport recently. That namely included Indiana a week ago before their hire of West Virginia’s Darian DeVries.

However, Brownell clearly loves Clemson. They’ve built something there, on and off the court, over the past decade and a half, especially recently over the last half of that span, and he wants to continue to do that with the Tigers.

“Obviously, I’m extremely excited about it, happy. Clemson has been a very special place for me and my family for 15 years. And just have thoroughly enjoyed building the program,” said Brownell. “Love what Clemson stands for as a university and proud to be a, a part of it. Certainly, I sent my daughters there. So we’re all in, as Dabo likes to say.”

“Excited about where my, my program is. I think we’ve done an unbelievable job, you know, from facility improvements all the way to, you know, success initiatives on the floor, off the floor,” Brownell continued. “Excited to try to continue this level of success.”

Brownell is 292-195 (.600) at Clemson, including 168-92 (.646) since 2017, where they’ve been ranked at some point in five of those eight seasons, with the Tigers setting a school record for wins this season so far with 27. This season has also extended his program record with five berths now in the NCAA Tournament as a No. 5 seed coming off an appearance in the Elite Eight last season as a No. 6 seed.

Brownell is among the longer-tenured current coaches at his respective school in college basketball. That will continue moving forward with this expected new deal set to keep him at Clemson.