Days away from the season opener, Maryland men’s basketball head coach Kevin Willard looked ahead to what he expects to “absolutely different styles” between this season and last on the offensive end.
Maryland is tasked with replacing over 45% of its scoring from last season with both Jahmir Young and Donta Scott in year one of their pro careers, but between the portal additions in the backcourt and the Baltimore duo in the frontcourt, Willard sees more balanced scoring in year three.
“We kind of wanted to make sure we didn’t have too much pressure on one guy like it was last year. Even the year before, Jahmir [Young] first year, Hakim [Hart] took a lot of pressure with a lot of ball-handling skills. So I think one of the things that we wanted to get back to was being more of a balanced offense, but more balanced attack,” Willard said on Talkin’ Terps with Johnny Holiday. “[It’s] still college basketball so you’re still going to have a guard-heavy attack but the fact that we have Derik Queen, the fact that we have Julian Reese be able to play big, throw the ball inside. We are going to be able to play absolutely different styles.”
A big part of Queen’s ability to blossom into the immediate impact that many have praised him to be is his improved conditioning after working with Kyle Tarp, director of basketball performance, through the offseason to shed 17 pounds and “quite a bit of body fat since he’s got on campus,” Willard added.
“He plays at his own pace which a lot of kids nowadays because they didn’t grow up in a park, they didn’t play pick-up basketball, it’s games [and] AAU, [they] don’t understand pace and Derik plays at his own pace. Sometimes it looks like he’s slow, sometimes it looks like he’s lazy but next thing you know, he’s got 16 and 12 and he’s not so slow and lazy,” Willard added.
While Queen and Reese look to control the paint on both ends of the floor, a big piece in their success on the offensive end this season will come off the pick-and-roll as new point guard Ja’Kobi Gillespie looks ahead to “just learning my teammates more, just knowing when to give them the ball and when to do my thing.”
While Willard joked that transition defense was an area of improvement for Gillespie as he adjusts heading into his first year in the program, how the former Belmont star would fare in the Big Ten was the next question.
Gillespie averaged over 17 points per game as a sophomore while shooting over 56% from the field and 38% from deep, but Willard also pointed to the data to solidify the belief he found his next point guard early in the portal window.
“When you look at guys going from a lower level to the Big Ten, you really have to look at do you think they can make the jump and still play at a level that they’re playing at? And all of Ja’Kobi’s numbers – and we use an AI company – really pointed to the fact that he was one of the guys in the portal that can come up and make that jump from the MVC to the Big Ten.”
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