Outside of the glamour franchises such as the Los Angeles Lakers, Los Angeles Clippers and Brooklyn Nets, perhaps no one had a better offseason than the Utah Jazz. Now, ahead of a much-anticipated season, the club has made sure that Quin Snyder will be their head coach for years to come. 

According to a report from ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski, the Jazz have signed Snyder to a long-term contract extension. Terms of the agreement haven’t been made available, though Wojnarowski reported that the deal “extends multiple years” past the two remaining years on Snyder’s current deal. 

Snyder is now entering his sixth season with the Jazz and has grown into one of the best coaches in the league. He’s led the Jazz to the playoffs in each of the past three seasons and has compiled a 227-183 record during his tenure with the team. Given his success, it’s little surprise that the Jazz would want to keep him around, and giving him an extension now is a sign of confidence ahead of a big season for the team. 

During the offseason, the Jazz swung a blockbuster trade for Mike Conley, then got busy in free agency, signing Bojan Bogdanovic, along with Jeff Green, Ed Davis and Emmanuel Mudiay. The reinforcements, coupled with the demise of the Warriors and question marks about many of the top teams in the West, have lifted the Jazz from solid playoff team to potential contender. 

Heading into the season, only the Bucks, 76ers and Rockets have a higher win total over/under than the Jazz’s 53.5, according to Westgate SuperBook. If they’re able to hit the over, that will cement their best regular season record since 2008, when they went 54-28. 

They’ll still have their work cut out for them in the playoffs against the elite teams like the Clippers and Lakers, but they’re always going to be a stout defensive team, and Conley and Bogdanovic should give their offense a big boost. With some improvement from Donovan Mitchell, it’s not out of the question that they can make some noise in the West. At the very least, they’re going to be much more formidable than the past two seasons, when they were overmatched against the best of the best. 

In handing Snyder another extension, the Jazz front office is signaling that they believe in his ability to lead the Jazz to bigger and better things than just making the playoffs.