Grief became a common theme for Maryland football in the months leading up to the 2024 season.
“It’s been tough, man. Being a Terp football player, we had a tough summer,” head coach Mike Locksley said on Tuesday. “We lost, obviously, Isaiah Hazel. We honored Jo Jo Walker, [a] kid I recruited out of Dallas, Texas this summer. Kenny Goins to a motorcycle accident. Just tired of seeing this trend. And then for Josiah [McLaurin], obviously, the little known story is that he really struggled this summer being here. He became like, every year I have one or two kids that I call kind of Locks’ kids and he became that because I know that he's from a small little town, really close with his granddad and his dad were here on his official visit, and he was homesick most of the summer. And we did everything good to keep him and [if] we could just get him to training camp where football kicks in, and that's kind of what happened.”
Just prior to the start of his freshman year, McLaurin’s father, Robert “Todd” McLaurin, and his cousin, Kirk, were killed in a hit-and-run on Aug. 24. McLaurin opted to stay in College Park in the days after, eventually returning home for the funeral on Sept. 2, but the team knew it was time to support one of the newest Terps through a difficult time.
“Our team is a family,” Locksley said. “Robert Smith, who's one of our leaders, he lost his mom to cancer. So I pulled Robert, I said, take him under your wing. We got this thing this year where every player each week has to get one person in the program, that is my guy. Like, I got you this week. So, you know, like this week I got Dylan Wade. I've been texting him since Sunday and so Robert got him and I knew during the course of the week that he was a guy that could help us.”
“I think one who speaks on the type of team we have,” running back Nolan Ray added. “Everybody was there for him, supporting him, loving on him, but then for him to stay here with us and playing that game is special and then he ended up scoring a touchdown, so you can't ask for anything.”
Maryland’s rushing attack shined as expected in the season opener, amassing nearly 250 yards while averaging over five yards per carry, while McLaurin added three yards on a pair of rushes in the closing minutes of the game. But the freshman found himself on the field much earlier than that in the fourth quarter after taking his first touch 24 yards into the endzone off a swing pass from QB Cam Edge.
“It meant a lot to me,” McLaurin said via UMTerps. “I had a pretty hard week, and football is the only place I get where I’m mentally free, and I don’t have to think about anything but what I’m doing on the field. That touchdown meant a lot to me, man. That was for my dad. I know it meant a lot to me and my family. I made my dad proud today. I just wish he was here to see it.”
Locksley added the staff put the play in “expecting that, hopefully, it would do what it did for him and for him to get the touchdown on the play.” McLaurin found himself surrounded by his teammates in the endzone into the sideline in the moments after securing his first career touchdown.
“Dante Trader gave him the game ball in the locker room after the game and he said, ‘God works in mysterious ways’. Very happy,” quarterback Billy Edwards Jr. added. “It was a very cool moment as a player, as a teammate to witness him able to go in on his first collegiate game and get his first touchdown. But yeah, Josiah, tough as nails. It was a really cool experience to watch that. Sucks but we love Josiah. We'll continue to be around him and he's been, like I said, tough as nails like he's been the same kid all week. You obviously think to yourself, putting myself in his shoes, it's hard. It's probably one of the hardest, if not the hardest things we can go through. But yeah, he handled it great. And it was, like I said, I think it meant more to the team that we were able to be there for him, and be around him for the week leading up to the game. And then for him to have the touchdown on Saturday. I think that made it all, us feel good for him. I'm sure it helped him get a few laughs and high spirits with the week he had but it was tough situation. But like I said, God works in mysterious ways and it worked out well for his first game, but we'll continue to love up on him and be on him, how however he may need, but he's a tough kid.”
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