Kevin Willard has accepted an offer to be the next head basketball coach at Villanova, sources with knowledge of Willard’s situation told InsideMDSports on Saturday. Willard, who led the Terps to the Sweet 16 this season but was surrounded by speculation this month after a strange week-plus saga full of his public gaffes and giveaways about his impending departure, leaves Maryland in need of a quick replacement hire and a lot of work on a potentially depleted roster.
Willard’s departure comes as no surprise. InsideMDSports reported earlier this week was planning to take the Nova job, and he did little to quell speculation after Maryland’s season-ending loss to Florida. Moments after stating he hadn’t spoken to any other schools and was unaware if his agent had either, he spoke as if he had an option other than to fulfill the remaining four years of a contract paying him more than $4 million annually.
It’s a sour end to a momentous season for the Maryland men’s basketball program. Willard’s move leaves Maryland without a coach at one of the most vital times of year, a week into the transfer portal window, with a roster in need of mass reinforcements. The Terps will lose two key seniors, Julian Reese and Selton Miguel, and are expected to lose freshman phenom Derik Queen to the NBA Draft. The two remaining standouts, guards Ja’Kobi Gillespie and Rodney Rice, could enter the transfer portal, leaving Maryland without a single proven high-level player.
It ends an awkward final chapter during which the coach blasted the school’s basketball funding, unceremoniously ended his boss’s 10-year tenure by revealing he was leaving for SMU and pretended not to know if Villanova was pursuing him.
Sourcew said the third-year Terps coach unofficially accepted an offer from the Big East school early this week at the latest and will likely announce it today ending his stay at Maryland after three up-and-down seasons. The high-water mark came his season, when Maryland tied for second in the Big Ten and reached its second Sweet 16 in more than 20 years, but abruptly turned sour when it became apparent the coach was secretly planning to leave whenever his team was eliminated from the tournament.
That happened Thursday night in San Francisco, where No. 4 seed Maryland’s season ended in a loss to No. 1 seed Florida, 87-71.
He was asked afterward if Villanova was pursuing him.
“I have no idea,” Willard said, claiming that he hadn’t communicated with anyone at Villanova and didn’t know if his agent had talked to the Big East school.
That dubious statement and his comments during the previous week had turned an excited fanbase against him.
“I understand fans are going to be pissed, because I’m in limbo and this and that. I get it, like I’m kind of pissed, to be honest with you, because I didn’t expect to be in this situation,” Willard said afterward.
The situation combusted during his opening press conference at the NCAA Tournament a week-and-a-half-ago, when he abruptly revealed AD Damon Evans was leaving for SMU and publicly blasted the administration’s funding of the basketball program. Later, he said in a radio he was committed to returning “as of now,” then he blamed the media for theatt dodged questions about his future by talking about his dinner the previous night and the Florida game.
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Willard, 49, was in his third and best season at Maryland, where he’s posted a 65-38 overall and 32-28 in Big Ten play. But his future fell in doubt last week when it was reported he was the top choice for Villanova, and was amplified during his opening press conference at the NCAA Tournament last week, when he abruptly revealed AD Damon Evans was leaving for SMU and publicly blasted the administration’s funding of the basketball program.
Sources said Villanova gauged Willard’s interest through his agent sometime around the start of the postseason, perhaps earlier. While other schools needing head coaches made their hires quickly, Villanova sat on its hands despite the opening of the transfer portal, a vital window for teams to rebuild by adding transfers. That VU was willing to wit during that window was a dead giveaway that they expected Willard to take the job, despite a few last-ditch efforts by a now athletic director-less Maryland. By midway through this pst week, as his team prepared for the program’s biggest game in decades, it was becoming an open secret in industry circles that he was leaving.
By Thursday, high-ranking program supporters and general fans were anywhere between confused and enraged, some big wigs feelingWillard had misled them into believing he wanted to return while planning to take the Nova job regardless. Only Willard and Maryland’s administration know what his exact demands were and if they were met, but he’d painted them as relatively minor requests for funding and Maryland staffers insisted they’d agreed to them.a
During an interview on the Kevin Sheehan Show on Tuesday, Willard said talks with school president Darryll Pines and marketing director Brian Ullmann were going well.
“He actually sat down with me and really asked what my concerns were and what I wanted. It’s not a contractual thing for me—it’s a program thing, “Brian and I are on the same page. He’s put a lot of what I’ve felt over the last three years into action. That’s what matters to me. I want to elevate this program to the best,” Willard said, hinting this frustration with Evans not investing enough in the basketball program. This wasn’t an after-the-fact complaint; during he first two years of NIL, sources confirmed Maryland regularly couldn’t contend with big-budget schools for top recruits.
“As of right now, I’m staying,” he said. “Everything that my concerns have been about the job—and that was my whole point of the press conference—was that I want to make this program the best. When you have an opportunity to do it, you have to take advantage of it.”
Everything you need to know about the weeklong Kevin Willard-Maryland basketball saga
But that “as of now” left a lot of wiggle room and the next day, when asked a couple of job-related questions, he answered with unrelated comments about his dinner the previous night and defending Florida star Walter Clayton.
By the time they arrived for their second-round game against Colorado State on Sunday, wave of Willard-to-Villanova whispers among coaches and other industry insiders grew into a constant chorus. For good reason; the two sides had quietly reached an agreement that he’d be the Wildcats’ new coach, returning to his Big East roots after coaching for less than half of a seven-year deal worth about $4 per yer.
Now Maryland will be looking for a new coach at a time of year when few good free agents are available and recruiting needs to start immediately. The Terps will lose stters Julian Reese and Selton Miguel and are expected to lose star freshman Derik Queen to the NBA Draft, leaving standout guards Ja’Kobi Gillespie and Rodney Rice as the only proven commodities remaining on the roster. But they have high value in the portal, so there’s no guarantee they’ll return.
In the span of about a week, Maryland learned it needs a new AD, a new coach and a new roster. When his final press conference as Maryland’s coach was done, he was asked if he would’ve changed anything about the tumultuous final week or so of his time as Maryland’s coach, when he was eyeing another job while Maryland’s players and fans were eyeing the program’s best March in recent years.
“Nope,” he said, not at all.”
Others would disagree.
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