What is the payroll for the Alabama basketball roster now that schools are paying players?
Sources close to the program told the Tuscaloosa News that Alabama’s revenue share contribution to men’s basketball totals out to approximately 14% of the $20.5 million per year now required to be paid to athletes at major-conference schools under the terms of the landmark House v. NCAA lawsuit settlement.
This means Alabama men’s basketball players are splitting approximately $2.9 million in funds from the school. The school does not disclose what each player makes out of that.
This figure does not include name, image and likeness (NIL) deals that players can also make to enhance their compensation through the school's Yea Alabama collective or from deals made outside the collective.
Alabama has not disclosed how much of the House settlement money is allocated to each sport. Football, naturally, gets the largest portion.
Alabama has also invested in an under-construction multimillion-dollar basketball practice facility and in coach Nate Oats. His latest deal with UA, approved in March 2024 in the year the coach took the Crimson Tide to its first Final Four, paid $5 million in the first year and grows to $7.55 million in the final year. That contract carries into March 2030.
Approved in the summer of 2024, the House v. NCAAsettlement marked the formal start of revenue sharing between schools and athletes, ending decades of the NCAA’s amateurism model. The settlement requires major-conference schools to directly share a portion of athletic revenue with athletes while also creating a damages fund to compensate former athletes who were not allowed to earn money while playing under previous rules.
Under the new model, schools can distribute up to a capped amount annually — roughly $20.5 million in the current school year and rising to approximately $32.9 million by 2034-35 — to athletes across their athletic departments. The agreement also reshaped roster limits and scholarship structures, signaling a shift toward a more professionalized college sports landscape under the umbrella of the NCAA.
Alabama athletics director Greg Byrne told The Tuscaloosa News this past August that Alabama works with coaches – and, in football, with general manager Courtney Morgan – to assess the market for players in sports that are receiving House settlement funds to determine how much is spent on each player.
He noted that Alabama has structured its allocation of settlement funds based on revenue generated by each sport. Six Crimson Tide sports teams receive shares while 15 do not, according to Byrne.
Byrne also said Alabama has added “approximately 42 scholarships" across multiple sports. Those scholarships are distributed based on Title IX guidelines.
“Some schools have been more aggressive than us,” Byrne said. “If you asked every single coach, they'd want rev share, and understandably.
“We just do our very best to structure it the way we think that gives us the best opportunity to remain competitive across the board as a department.”
