Liberty University has announced a new contract extension for head basketball coach Ritchie McKay. This new contract extension runs his contract through the 2031-32 season, adding one year on to his previous contract extension a year ago. The financial details were not immediately available.
The extension comes on the heels of a 2025-26 season when McKay and the Flames posted a 26-8 overall record and 17-3 CUSA mark, winning the CUSA outright regular season title for a second straight year. Liberty won the league by four games and started 15-0 in conference play. McKay guided the Flames to 17 straight wins, a new program record, from Dec. 16-Feb. 19. McKay was named the 2025-26 CUSA Co-Coach of the Year, his fourth career conference coach of the year honor.
He first came to Liberty in 2007, serving as the Flames’ head coach for two seasons, posting a 39-28 overall record and 19-13 mark in Big South play. He led the Flames to a 23-12 record in 2008-09, at the time matching the program’s NCAA Division I record for most wins in a season. That team featured several talented recruits McKay brought to the Mountain, including Seth Curry who finished his freshman season averaging 202. Points per game and was named the 2009 Big South Freshman of the Year. Curry was part of a recruiting class which was ranked No. 48 in the country by Basketball Times.
After his first two years in Lynchburg, McKay joined his friend Tony Bennett as an assistant coach at Virginia in Charlottesville. He spent six seasons under Bennett, learning his famed Pack Line Defense during his time before returning to Liberty in 2015.
In the four seasons prior to McKay’s return to Liberty, the Flames lost 84 games, averaging 21 losses per season over that stretch. In his first year back at Liberty, the Flames would lose 13 straight Division I games to open his second tenure before he began to turn the ship.
McKay and Liberty have posted nine 20-win seasons over the past 10 campaigns, including a school-record 30 wins during the 2019-20 season. McKay and the Flames won the ASUN title in the program’s first three years in the conference, punching their ticket to the NCAA Tournament in each instance. Liberty had three ASUN Tournament titles and four ASUN regular season crowns in four years in the league as well as the East Division title during the 2021-22 campaign.
McKay and the Flames made history in 2019, winning the school’s first ever NCAA Tournament game against 5-seed Mississippi State. The Flames received a 12-seed in that year’s Big Dance, the first time the program had reached the Tournament as anything other than a 16-seed. Liberty would also earn its first ever AP Top 25 vote in the history of the program that season while also earning votes in the USA Today Coaches Poll.
McKay and the Flames won 27 games during the 2022-23 season, earning a share of the ASUN regular season crown. Liberty would advance to the NIT for the first time in school history, picking up a win over 2022 Final Four participant Villanova. Liberty would finish the year at No. 46 in the country in the NET rankings and No. 48 in KenPom, both new program records at season’s end.
Over his first 13 seasons at Liberty, McKay has guided the Flames to postseason play in nine seasons including four NCAA Tournament appearances, two NIT berths, and three CIT appearances.
