It’s far too early to judge the bitter spring breakup between coach Kevin Willard and Maryland, but the quick installation of Buzz Williams as his successor has netted near-instant results for the Terps. While Willard’s Villanova tenure is off to a slow start so far, Williams has injected momentum into a once-bleak situation in College Park.
Making a quick splash is hard for any coach, it was even more difficult with a Maryland fan base soured from Willard’s acrimonious departure. But after one month on the job (as of Thursday), Williams is building a solid roster through a zealous attack on the transfer portal.
Here’s where the program sits after adding another transfer earlier this week.
Huge recruiting win
Four-star combo guard Darius Adams, the No. 26 overall player in the Class of 2025 and a long-time UConn pledge, decommitted from the Huskies on April 19 and officially flipped his pledge to the Terps 10 days later. The decision nets Maryland its fourth-highest ranked recruit in the modern era — all of whom were McDonald’s All-Americans. He’s the first Maryland-bound McDonald’s All-American guard since Melo Trimble in 2012.
Here’s what they’re getting in him, according to 247Sports’ Adam Finkelstein:
Adams is a skilled and smooth guard with good positional size at 6-foot-5 and an instinctive feel for the game. He’s a multi-dimensional scoring threat who can make threes and mid-range pull-ups in a variety of different ways.
He’s coming off an EYBL season in which he averaged 15 points per game on 40% shooting from the floor, 32% from behind the arc, and 59% from the free-throw line, but is widely considered to be a better shooter than that. As a junior in EYBL Scholastic play, he also averaged 15 points per game, but did it on 43% shooting from the floor and 41% from behind the arc. The long-range shooting projects as the first domino in his individual offense at the next level. He has…
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