Salaries up for assistants

PULLMAN – Though salaries in the Washington State University men’s basketball program are still in the basement of the Pac-10, they’re trending upward.

Especially for first-year head coach Ken Bone’s assistants.

Bone recently agreed to a seven-year contract that will pay him at least $625,000 in his first year, about $400,000 less than his predecessor, Tony Bennett, earned in his third and final year as head coach before heading to the University of Virginia.

But Bone’s three assistants, holdover Ben Johnson and newcomers Jeff Hironoka and Curtis Allen, will make more than the previous group.

Johnson, who has been at WSU for five years, earned $110,000 in the 2008 fiscal year, the same as Bennett’s other assistants, Matt Woodley and Ron Sanchez.

Under his new contract, recently made available to The Spokesman-Review through a public records request, Johnson will earn $115,000. He also earned a $10,000 supplement to his 2008 salary in April after being the only assistant in the basketball office for a month.

Hironoka, who was the head coach at Seattle Pacific for seven years after serving as Bone’s main assistant there for 11, will earn even more this season, $120,000, which is double what Bennett’s assistants were making just two years ago.

Allen, the least experienced member of the staff, having been with Bone at Portland State for the past four years, will earn $90,000.

Efforts to reach Bone for comment Friday were unsuccessful.