In a first year that ended in a 71-53 NCAA Tournament Round of 32 loss to Alabama in 2023, new Maryland coach Kevin Willard had complaints. Plenty of them.
He was quick to tell anyone who would listen how much better things were in the Big East, the league he had just left after 12 seasons at Seton Hall. The scheduling, the travel, the emphasis on college basketball above all else.
Willard had issues with the Big Ten’s schedule and travel situations, which would only get worse when USC, UCLA, Oregon and Washington officially joined the conference, but it didn’t raise alarms early on the way maybe it should have. Many Maryland boosters and athletic department staffers were already used to dealing with similar complaints from Mark Turgeon, Willard’s predecessor, who frequently complained about the school’s decision to leave the basketball-fabled Atlantic Coast Conference for the Big Ten in 2014.
The hope was that Willard would settle in at the Big Ten school and get it back on track to the heights of the Gary Williams era that resulted in a 2002 national championship.
In hindsight, though, Willard’s comparisons to the Big East should have been a sign. Over the next two years, there were consistent whispers that Willard wasn’t particularly happy at Maryland and was frustrated that the perceived “basketball school” didn’t devote more resources to his program. It all came to a head in an ugly, more than week-long public saga that finally ended late Saturday night when Willard marked his return to his beloved Big East as Villanova’s new head coach.
Maryland is now without an athletic director and men’s basketball coach on March 30 with the transfer portal in full swing. The “Crab Five” that made it to a Sweet 16 could all be gone…
Source link : https://www.cbssports.com/college-basketball/news/he-played-us-like-a-drum-inside-kevin-willards-turbulent-maryland-departure/
Author : John Talty
Publish date : 2025-03-30 17:56:00
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