Ohio State University hired Urban Meyer as its football coach Monday, giving him one of the richest contracts ever in college sports — the latest indication that the big business of college football is undeterred by the nation’s broader economic woes or by concern about the prominence of sports on campus.

The contract includes $4 million in base salary, bonuses — for everything from players’ graduation rates to playing in a national championship, up to $700,000 annually — and lump payments in 2014, 2016 and 2018. The deal is worth more than three times the $1.32 million that the university’s president, E. Gordon Gee, made in 2010, according to The Chronicle of Higher Education.

Mr. Meyer and Ohio State reached the lucrative deal amid a chaotic year in college athletics. The University of Miami was rocked by a report that a donor lavished football players with gifts for years; and longtime assistants for the Penn State football and Syracuse men’s basketball teams are facing allegations that they sexually abused young boys. Several other prominent programs are being investigated by college athletics’ governing body, the N.C.A.A., for myriad violations.

Even the Buckeyes await potential N.C.A.A. sanctions because players traded memorabilia for cash and tattoos, which led to the ouster of Jim Tressel as their coach six months ago.