Scott Stricklin picks up $100,000 bonus for Florida's top-five Learfield Director's Cup finish

Florida has finished in fourth place in the Learfield Director’s Cup standings, the award meant to recognize overall athletic department success. Athletics director Scott Stricklin will benefit handsomely from that finish.

According to USA Today’s Steve Berkowitz, Stricklin is in line to receive a $100,000 bonus as part of the top-five finish.

Stricklin has been Florida’s athletics director since late 2016, when he took over for the highly successful Jeremy Foley. Foley, in many ways, has been credited with the emergence of Florida as an all-around sports powerhouse.

Florida’s fourth-place finish is one spot better than the program finished the last three seasons, when it ended at No. 5 nationally, a bit of a slip from prior years when the Gators dominated the top three of the standings. Florida last finished in third place in the 2018-19 season.

In this year’s standings Florida finished behind Texas, Stanford and Tennessee, in that order.

The year was marked by remarkable success in a handful of sports, with Scott Stricklin overseeing things. Both the baseball and softball teams reached the semifinals of the College World Series, capping the spring sports season in style.

The men’s track and field team won its third straight national title outdoors, continuing the remarkable run of success that track coach Mike Holloway has been on.

The men’s basketball team finally ended an NCAA Tournament drought and returned to the field in the Big Dance, though it was a trip cut short by an instant thriller loss to Colorado in one of the most exciting games of the tournament.

The gymnastics team reached the NCAA finals after a tremendous season, as well, while the lacrosse team collected the AAC title for the fourth time in the last six years.

Meanwhile, at the individual level, 11 different Florida athletes claimed a national title. They snagged 15 individual national titles between them, led by superstar runner Parker Valby claiming five national titles.

Bottom line, it was a tremendous season for Florida athletics and Scott Stricklin will pick up a nice bonus as a result.