Maryland men’s basketball coach Kevin Willard is meeting with Villanova officials on Saturday about the program’s coaching vacancy and his decision will “probably be announced soon,” a source with direct knowledge of the situation confirmed to The Baltimore Sun.
University of Maryland administrators told at least one prominent booster for the men’s basketball program earlier this week that Willard plans to leave for Villanova, but that Maryland is making a “last-ditch effort” to retain the coach, the same source told The Sun.
A Maryland spokesperson did not immediately return a request for comment.
Willard said after Maryland’s season-ending loss to No. 1 seed Florida in the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Tournament on Thursday night in San Francisco that he still hadn’t made a decision about his future.
“I haven’t talked to anybody,” Willard said Thursday. “I have an agent, I’m sure he’s talking to people — that’s what agents like to do. But, you know, I don’t know.”
Maryland recently offered Willard a new contract that met his demands for increased resources for the program, the source said, but Willard did not accept the deal.
Willard’s buyout at Maryland drops from $2 million to $1.5 million on Tuesday, but CBS reported that the difference in money “isn’t a big hurdle to getting a deal done.”
Willard has been linked to the Villanova job opening over the past two weeks, and rumors intensified in recent days when former athletic director Damon Evans left for the same role at Southern Methodist University and the coach publicly aired grievances about the men’s basketball program’s lack of funding. Villanova, which has won two men’s basketball national championships over the past decade, parted ways with coach Kyle Neptune after the season ended.
It would be a return to the Big East Conference for Willard, who the Terps hired from Seton Hall in 2022. Willard has made two trips to the NCAA Tournament with Maryland, including the program’s first appearance in the Sweet 16 since 2016.
VUhoops.com first reported that Willard was meeting with Villanova officials this weekend.
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