Kevin Willard on whether he's staying at Maryland or going to Villanova: "I don't know yet"

Ahmed Ghafir
Mar 27
5 min read

Updated: Mar 31

With Maryland men’s basketball’s 2024-25 season now officially over, head coach Kevin Willard publicly noted he’s unsure what his next steps are.

“I don't know what I'm doing. I'll just be honest with you. I haven't talked to my agent. I haven't talked to my wife,” Willard said postgame. “I made a promise to this team that I was going to just focus on this team and that's all I've done. So I haven't talked to anybody. I have an agent. I'm sure he's talking to people because that's what agents like to do. But I don't know.”

The news comes one day removed from chatter that Willard-to-Villanova was not just a possibility but a likely outcome as Willard noted the ongoing hurdles with his situation. Willard bluntly answered “nope” when asked if he’d change anything from his press conferences over the last week.

“Right now my biggest concerns in life right now -- I don't know who my boss is going to be. It's the guy that brought me here who I really liked and appreciative of him bringing me to College Park is not here anymore. And I don't know who we're going to hire. In today's day and age, that worries me a little bit. I'm just being honest. My honesty got me in trouble, might as well keep getting me in trouble. So this is going to be a family decision. I love College Park. I love Maryland. But when you're at this point in your career and you're looking at things, I have to take everything into consideration moving forward. But I have not even talked to anybody, so I don't know what I'm doing.”

There was some positive comments from Willard on Thursday.

“My guy, Brian Ullman, deserves a raise, because he's been phenomenal. The only person I've talked about in my job is with that man over there wearing the muscle hat. He has been absolutely phenomenal. But I'm not even sure if he's going to be here. So it's just one of those things right now.”

While Willard has taken growing heat from the Maryland fanbase amid the growing chatter about a coaching move, there’s one prominent booster he knows he can still lean on.

“I got my guy -- we would not be in the Sweet 16 if it wasn't for Harvey Sanders. Harvey Sanders runs our collective, does all the fundraising. He has been instrumental in getting us back to where we are. And Harvey gave me the biggest hug, so he matters. I understand fans are going to be pissed because I'm in limbo and this and that. I get it. I'm kind of pissed, to be honest with you, because I didn't expect to be in this situation.”

More from Kevin Willard

Opening statement

“Extremely disappointed that the season's over and it's a tough loss, but thrilled what this group of guys was able to come together and do and the season that we had. Just proud of them. They fought all year long. Starting off in conference play 1-3, and finding a way and battling and ended up with 14 Big Ten wins and making the Sweet 16 with only two guys that ever played in the NCAA Tournament before. So extremely proud. This was by far the best team I've ever been around. Proud of Julian. He's going to go down as one of the best players to ever play at the University of Maryland. We're going to hang his number one day because of just what he did for this program. And really proud of my young big guy here to kind of go through the Big Ten the first time and play the way he's played all year, these two guys have been great. So, disappointing. Florida is really good. They're deep. I think their bench was what really wore us down. But proud of the season.”

On accomplishments from the 2024-25 season

“I really enjoyed coaching this basketball team. From the time they stepped on campus in June, they've just been so much fun to coach, and to kind of see them grow together, have the wins we had on the road, have some of the toughest losses that I've ever dealt with, buzzer-beaters, and to overcome that was huge for me. It was one of those things -- it was just a whole lot of fun. The staff said it the other day, they're so much fun to be around. And they accomplished a lot. In today's world of trying to put together a roster in three weeks, these guys all made great strides. Again, only two guys to play in a NCAA Tournament before was Julian and Jordan. So for those guys to be great leaders and for us to get to the Sweet 16, I think it shows you how good a group of kids they were.”

On whether there’s anything Maryland can do now to mitigate the issues

On the slow start from the second half

“Actually, we've been getting off to horrendous starts in the second half. Colorado State, we got down 13. We came out at home against Northwestern, didn't play well. We haven't been playing overly well to start the second half. I think we've talked about it as a group and we looked at it. When you play a team that can come off the bench with the guys that they can come off the bench with, that was a big worry. We battled. These guys were battling. I thought the biggest play was the rebound that Condon got and threw it up to the rim. I think it was a seven-point game at the time and pushed it to nine. I thought that was a really big momentum breaker. But we haven't been starting well for a while. We've been playing well in the second half. We just haven't been starting well. And that start really hurt us.”

On Maryland getting outrebounded, 42-20, in the loss

“It's what they do. They're the number three offensive rebounding team in the country. They're the largest -- they score more points off offensive rebounding than any team in the country. You have to give them credit. They do a really good job of it.”

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