Mike Locksley on Maryland football's bye week, freshmen development, defensive success

Ahmed Ghafir
Sep 22
11 min read

Everything that head coach Mike Locksley said at the start of Maryland football's first bye week:

On WR Shaleak Knotts

“I've talked a lot about the importance of what, Punch being here, what this place has done for Punch. From a maturity standpoint, from the standpoint of coming in academically, this is a really tough school academically and he had to utilize - and did utilize - every resource we've offered. He's on track to graduate in December which is something I'm really proud of not just for him, but for the people in our program. Our academic support, people from Devon [Frieson] and Kendall and Sierra and Mackenzie and a group of people that we always say it takes a village to still raise a child. And I can tell you, there's been a hell of a village here for Punch during the course of his time here. And it's been very beneficial to him and we're starting to reap the benefits of what we've poured in and invested into him by getting results on the field from him, which is what we've always shot for.”

On whether the challenges hindered Shaleak’s on-field success

“I don’t. I mean, I think, you know, he played behind some talented players. He's always been kind of that fifth, the fourth or fifth guy. And now he's obviously in the top two, top three of our receiving core now. I don't think his off-the-field, academics and maybe some of the habits and behaviors contributed. I just think everyone has a different timing for when it clicks and when it comes together. We saw that out of Tai Felton a year ago where Tai had been more of a complement, and then all of a sudden, things clicked, and he ends up - he became a very good player for us a year ago. And that's kind of what we're seeing out of Punch. I think his confidence is high because he's making plays. But I can tell you, I mean, he was a very capable player coming out of high school. I would have loved to have had this out of him a couple of years earlier, but you know what, his timing is his timing and it's all starting to come together for him and we're reaping the benefits of it.”

On keeping the focus through the bye week

“I think how we manage success is as important as how we manage adversity. The only way we know how to do it is based on our standards. The things that they said that they wanted as a team. And if we focus more on the standard and less on the outcomes, that that's how you do it, and that's how you prevent guys from - and I'm sure as a coach, I've gotten a million text messages about, congrats, big win, big win. And so I can only imagine what those guys are getting. And this is where for us, we've gotta do a great job as coaches [of] managing that the expectations are still internal. They aren't external. We've created the standard in which we know. We always say how you create repeated success? Well, it's through the process that you create and that's where the standard that these players have created leads the charge for us to do that. And so it's really important that we do manage some of the early success we have. But I can tell you that we show ‘em every time, every game, there's a bunch of things to get cleaned up with this team. And so as long as we focus on the technical, the fundamental, development piece, I think it's easy to keep them locked in on doing things and approaching it with the same intentionality.”

On QB Malik Washington’s growth through four weeks

“Yeah, I would say the maturity piece how he elevated the Spalding program. We're starting to see that here. He went into Spalding before Spalding was a program that had had great success and it was because of how he played and obviously bringing in people with them. People want to play with him. And so to see the maturity that he's shown, but also how he elevates the people around him has been really consistent and throughout his career, in high school and now. And then, as a passer, I think what's happened now is the understanding of coverages, the pre-snap decisions of being able to - a lot like the SAT where you need to be able to eliminate what's not the answer as quickly as possible and limit what the answer can be. And I think Pep [Hamilton] and Ted [Monachino] and our offensive staff have done a really good job of how we've kind of gotten him going and how we've taught him to process things before the ball is snapped. To me, that helps and allows him to align himself.

And then the other piece is, very rarely do you see Malik make the same mistake. I'll give an example. He missed the post earlier in the game to 84, to Kaleb Webb. He needs to throw him a little further open or away from the defender, needs to put a little more air under the ball. And the next one he hit was the one to Punch in a critical point in the game where he made the adjustment and made the correction, which a lot like all these other kids on our team, when we've made emphasis on things, we've been able to achieve them. And I saw him do that in-game. So it was really pleased with seeing him be able to self-correct.”

“The one he missed was to Kaleb Webb earlier in the game. We took a shot and if he throws Kaleb away from the defender. He had plenty of space to throw in the green grass and he didn't put enough air on the ball which if you put air on the ball, it allows a little room for error for us to run underneath it. And I thought he made the adjustment and did a tremendous job the to the last touchdown to Punch with putting enough air under it, throwing him away from the defender, so saw him self correct within the game.”

On reviewing his team’s first road trip

“To me, that's what this - everything has been new for this team. That’s why when people kind of compare last year to this year, there's no way to compare, because it's such a different team, so many different pieces and people involved. And so the first trip went without any snags. Kudos to Annie Peppard and our operation staff, who has to move our operation across the country to Wisconsin for a day and a half. We were able to get there on time. We're able to get to the stadium and kind of get our bearings underneath us on Friday so that when we got in there early Saturday morning to go play, there was a familiarity there for us. You can tell that with this group, everything was new. I saw guys kind of, you know, taking their phones out. And I'm like one of my pet peeves, I don't [take] pictures in their stadium like we're in awe of what their facilities look like. And so toolbox experiences for me to teach and coach, but really like the way that they mentally prepared. I really like this team. Like I said, they're just young and dumb and don't know what they don't know and that’s been the fun part about coaching them. And they play that way. They just play really carefree. They don't play cautious, they don't play fearful, they don't play as if they've already experienced bad things. They just go out and, I mean, they're having fun. And that's to me - I told somebody today, looking at [Aliou] Bah’s face during the game, seeing a smile on his face in the course of the game. This is like before - it was still a close game that he was having fun. And, I mean, that's what this young team has done. They've really taken every challenge and everything that we've thrown at them and they've had fun with the learning and the growing and the maturing that we see right before our eyes.”

On conditioning the team with ‘Jump Around’ ahead of the game

“Thursday, we go in our indoor and whenever we play away, we emphasize the crowd noise for the offense. Chad [Wells], our video guy piped in. We usually have crowd noise, but we threw the Jump Around song, kept playing all Thursday so that they kind of got used to it. I didn't spend a lot of time talking about it, telling them what to expect because, again, this is also new for them. I try to rehearse everything with this team and for them to understand like that'll create a little bit of some external motivation for their crowd and their people. But for us, if we're playing the way we're supposed to, that it shouldn't have an impact on the game and it really didn't. And I think our players, they prepared themselves the right way to go into a tough environment and get a tough road win. And I really like that about this squad.”

On Kevyn ‘Kerm’ Humes playing the nickel, whether technical or personnel based

“I mean, probably a little bit of both. That slot nickel position can be a corner or a safety. And this year, we've used it more as a corner because of the amount of man coverage we played. Now we have the luxury of [Jalen] Huskey, who's been a corner, having the ability to go in the slot as a safety and give us kind of what Glen Miller gave us, kind of that combo guy. But with Kerm, Kerm’s short area quickness in the slot, he plays with a physicality. For a little guy, he's a good blitzer, does a good job of getting his pads underneath people. You usually put your best cover guy in that position, because they have the whole field to run and cover and Kerm is one of those guys that can run really well. His short area quickness, his ability to tackle the ball and be physical as a force defender when they do run the ball. So those things went into it. It gave us the ability and the flexibility when you have a corner that can play the slot but also be physical against the run. It gave us the ability to add a better cover guy in there than maybe what we've seen. I mean, he's probably played it the best. Tarheeb Still was one of those guys that played in the slot for us as well and we see him progressing very similar.”

On Maryland’s defensive success statistically, blend of experience and youth

“That’s how that's been our secret sauce is that we've gotten great leadership from veteran players that have played a lot of reps like a Huskey, who's since he's been here. Like a Daniel Wingate that's been here for three years and has been a contributor all three. And then when you throw in Cam Rice, who came in from Ohio University, but if you look at the amount of plays he's played in his career, that leadership is something that these young guys who are bringing energy. They bring tremendous athleticism. When you look at [Sidney Stewart] and [Zahir Mathis] and [CJ Smith] and [Jayden Shipps], all these guys are super athletic, super talented. They just need the reps and that's where the experience of the leaders on the defensive side has really helped those guys grow up fast.”

On third 4-0 start in five seasons, difference between the 2025 vs. 2023 & 2021 teams

“If you look at 2021, and 2023 if that's I don't recall, because I again, I haven't kept up with it, but I would say that if we were falling on both those years, that the success, obviously we were we were able, but I think ‘23 was a bowl year for us, and I think ‘21 was a bowl year for us. But I would say this one feels different because of the veteran players we have, but then the talent level. I mean, I've never played this many true freshmen. I don't think if you just look at how young and inexperienced we were as the season started, I would say that the focus that we went into of building through the high school and not necessarily just kind of what most people have done the last few years. Portaling has paid off, because to land guys like Zahir Mathis and we got DeJuan Williams out of the high school ranks and he was committed I think to Ohio State at one point. A lot of these players were heavily recruited, the Jaylen Gilchrist guys. These guys were guys that had the ability to come in and help us early. And we recognize that so very fortunate that we hit on the evaluations of these guys but I'd say that it feels a little bit different because of the level in which these guys have been able to come in probably a little more ready than most of the freshmen that we've had to play over the years. We played a bunch of freshmen a year ago in the secondary and it didn't work very well for us, but I think with this group, these guys have met the challenges and have allowed us. That's probably why it feels a little differently than it has in the past.”

On development of Zahir Mathis, Sidney Stewart

“I'd say the big one probably for Sid is that Sid had a spring under his belt. And Ted Monachino who we hired late in the process there to be our DC and along with coach Aazaar [Abdul-Rahim] as our co-DC, coaches our outside backers. And if you've ever had a chance to watch Ted and his detail, very similar to what Hal Hunter brought to our offensive line. A veteran, NFL guy that really understands the fundamental piece of coaching that position. If you evaluate what those guys have done from DD Holmes, who comes in and plays a bunch of reps for us, Nahsir Taylor has played a bunch. 29 and nine. We got Neeo Avery back healthy. Ted's done a really good job with their development but I think with guys like Sidney, because he was here for the spring, that allowed him maybe to be a little further ahead. But I can tell you that, you know, when Zahir got here in June, he spent a bunch of time coming up during spring as well, even though he didn't graduate early. Because he was close enough to campus, he would come down on weekends and spend the weekends here. And our staff did a really good job of starting the installation piece with them, even though he wasn't in school here yet, which I think allowed him to come in with a good understanding and grasp of what we're going to do on defense, which allows him to play early and play fast and play efficiently.”

On the impact of community outreach

“Anybody that knows me knows that it's big. If we want to get fans behind our program and we want to get supporters to invest and bring resources, we have to integrate ourselves into the community. Whether it's on campus or whether it's in the Prince George's County, whether it's up in Baltimore, which wherever you're a Terps fan, we consider that to be Terpsville. And the way you do it is by giving back and by modeling what it looks like. And so even prior to NIL, we would require our players to do community service hours during the year. And we were always one of those programs that tended to have a bunch of guys, and Dillan [Fontus] was one of the ones early. If you look at his background, an ordained minister coming out of high school. He was an ordained minister at his church up there in New York. So he understands the giving back and helping others, which has really, he has modeled that for our team. The first recipient of the Jackie Robinson Award, which goes to the Big Ten student athlete, not just football player, that that has done a tremendous job in the community. And there's no doubt that Dillan, even prior to NIL, rev share, this was something that was really big for him, and it's something that's been always important for me to make sure that our players understand that it's important that we do give back to this community because of what this community affords us the ability to do.”

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