Locksley is a co-front-runner to coach Terrapins
Alabama offensive coordinator Mike Locksley and Michigan assistant head coach Pep Hamilton have emerged as the front-runners for the Maryland football head coaching vacancy, a source familiar with the situation said Friday.
Locksley, whose ties to the Maryland program go back more than 20 years, will be interviewed after the top-ranked Crimson Tide play in the Southeastern Conference championship game Saturday. Hamilton, whose regular season ended with a 62-39 loss to Ohio State last week, will also be interviewed.
Matt Canada, who served as the Terps’ offensive coordinator and interim coach this past season, is also expected to be interviewed. He led Maryland after former coach DJ Durkin was placed on administrative leave in mid-August and after Durkin was fired Oct. 31.
Locksley and Hamilton are the “most serious” candidates, the source said.
Maryland could make a decision by the middle of next week, according to the source.
The 48-year-old Locksley served under three head coaches during his career in College Park: as running backs coach under Ron Vanderlinden in 1997, as running backs coach and recruiting coordinator under Vanderlinden and later Ralph Friedgen from 1998 through 2002, and as offensive coordinator under Randy Edsall from 2012 through 2015.
Locksley also served as interim coach of the Terps after Edsall was fired midway though the 2015 season. Despite the fact that Locksley might have brought four-star quarterback Dwayne Haskins Jr. with him had he been retained on a permanent basis, former athletic director Kevin Anderson hired Durkin, then a relatively unknown defensive coordinator at Michigan.
Locksley, a finalist for the Broyles Award given annually to college football’s top assistant coach, has previously served as head coach at New Mexico. After the Lobos went 1-11 in both 2009 and 2010, they started the 2011 season with four straight losses and Locksley was fired.
Under Edsall, Locksley, a former Towson State defensive back, helped with the team’s lackluster recruiting. The Terps went from being ranked 50th nationally in recruiting to 37th shortly after Lockley arrived in 2012, according to 247Sports.com — largely because of the signing of five-star wide receiver Stefon Diggs — but Maryland never gained much traction. The Terps’ Class of 2015 was ranked 47th in Edsall’s final season, which finished with Maryland going 1-5 with Locksley as the interim coach.
At New Mexico in 2009, Locksley had an altercation with a former New Mexico assistant. Locksley served a 10-day suspension and apologized to the assistant and to Lobos fans. Also in 2009, a former administrative assistant filed a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission accusing Locksley of age discrimination and sexual harassment. Locksley countered with a defamation lawsuit. The complaint was later dropped.
Pac-12 championship
No. 10 WASHINGTON 10, No. 17 UTAH 3: In Santa Clara, Calif., Byron Murphy returned a deflected interception 66 yards for the game’s only touchdown to lead Washington to a victory over Utah in an offensively challenged Pac-12 championship game Friday night.
In a matchup of the two stingiest defenses in the conference, neither offense could get much of anything going. So it was only fitting that a dropped pass by Utah (9-4, No. 17 CFP) led to an interception for Washington (10-3, No. 11 CFP) and the only touchdown. Both teams had been held to just one field goal when the Huskies broke through late in the third quarter.
Jason Shelley’s pass hit Siaosi Mariner in the hands inside the Washington 35. But Mariner couldn’t hold onto the ball and it ricocheted off his leg and into the hands of Murphy, who raced 66 yards for the score that made it 10-3.
Jordan Miller intercepted another pass from Shelley on the following drive and Murphy got his second interception of the game the next time Utah had the ball. The Huskies sealed the victory with a fourthdown stop in the final minute to earn a trip to the Rose Bowl.
MAC championship
NORTHERN ILLINOIS 30, BUFFALO 29: In Detroit, Marcus Childers threw a touchdown pass — his fourth of the game — to D.J. Brown with 1:09 to go as Northern Illinois rallied from a 19-point, second-half deficit to take a victory over Buffalo in the MidAmerican Conference championship game.
The 35-yard TD pass came on the eighth play of a 70-yard drive that took a little more than two minutes following a punt forced by Sutton Smith’s sack of Bulls quarterback Tyree Jackson.
NIU’s 2-point conversion failed and the Bulls (10-3) reached the Huskies’ 41-yard line before an incomplete pass on fourth down with 21 seconds left ended Buffalo’s hopes. The Huskies’ touchdown completed a comeback from a 29-10 deficit in the third quarter.