Buzz Williams Leads A New-Look Terrapins Men's Basketball Team Into The 2025-26 Season With Unified Vision and Fresh Faces

Fifteen new faces make up the Terps’ 2025-26 roster, but they’re connected by one common goal.

The Buzz Williams era has arrived in College Park and his new-look Maryland Terrapins are ready to hit the court with their new faces, style, groove and camaraderie. 

“We’re really excited,” Williams said. “We’re going to play really hard, play for one another, represent the institution on the floor and off the floor in a way that they would be proud of. We’re just at the beginning. We have a lot of work to do and many mountains to climb, but we’re going to climb each one in a way that’s sustainable so we can get to the next mountain.”

WIlliams is inheriting a program that experienced a mountain range of success a season ago. The Terps posted a 27-9 season in 2024-25, the first time a Maryland squad lost fewer than 10 games since its 2019-20 campaign.

But this year’s squad couldn’t look much different. Aside from junior guard Lukas Sotell, not one man on the roster has played a minute of Terrapin basketball before. 

“I’m excited to see how we play together and how we come together,” Kansas transfer David Coit said. “I think that we have a great roster in our building with a lot of character.”

The restarting of a basketball program could be seen as a deterrent by many, but this year’s roster looks at the upcoming season as an opportunity to blend a large variety of styles into one cohesive unit of success. 

“We have great chemistry,” Washington State transfer Isaiah Watts said. “We have great camaraderie. We’re still learning as we go, but it’s going to be a hell of a season. It’s going to be a great time.”

Williams is excited about the chance to coach a team that’ll likely find its identity and flow as the season progresses. 

“I’ve never tried to be the coach that has one specific style other than what fits their team,” Williams said. “How can we put them in a position to be as successful as possible? That’s our theme.”

He’s bringing one thing with him from Texas A&M (along with four players): an expectation of hard work and dedication to excellence and improvement. 

“Every day is physical when you play for Buzz Williams,” Virginia transfer Elijah Saunders said at Big Ten Media Day. “It's been a lot of work. It's probably been the hardest I've worked since I've been in college, but the experience has been amazing.”

After a summer of rigorous workouts and preseason preparation, Williams’ new-look roster is ready for its first season together, bonded through the hard work of the offseason.

“That shared suffering creates a commonality on where we want to be,” Williams said. “It’s where leaders begin to learn to lead. It’s where the followers learn how to follow better. It’s where those who need to learn how to use their voice learn to use it for the first time. It’s where those who listen learn to listen and execute.”

Under Williams, Maryland will be evaluated by more than just wins and losses. The unmeasured aspects will be as big a barometer of success as the trackable stats. 

“Excellence is in the margins,” Williams said. “A lot of times the winning is in the margins, but you always find excellence in the margins. The margins typically are the things that are intangible. Were you the first to the floor on a loose ball? Did you block out on a free throw? When it’s your ball out of bounds, were you the first one to the team huddle? On a timeout, did you spring there or did you walk there? How many high fives did you give? We try to measure as much as we can on the things that aren’t on the statsheet and we believe that those things in the margins impact the statsheet in a positive way.”

While the faces are fresh and unique, the effort and heart for Maryland and basketball will be evident every time they touch the floor.

“What we’re trying to be consumed with is ‘can we be a little better tomorrow than we were yesterday?’,” Williams said. “Our expectation is we need to change our idea of better and get better and then try to focus on improving instead of trying to prove someone else’s expectations outside the program.”

Maryland will play 30 regular-season games in 2025-26 that include a rigorous 20-game Big Ten slate in one of college basketball’s toughest conferences. 

“It’s a very competitive conference,” Texas A&M transfer Pharrel Payne said. “But we’re here to compete and we love to compete.”

Payne is one of the studs that joined Williams in his move to College Park excited to combine Williams’ legacy with a historic Maryland basketball program. 

“The work is very valuable,” Andre Mills said of his time with Williams in College Station. “The reps are very valuable. Without the work and the reps, nothing else shows.”

When talking to or being around anyone in the 2025-26 Terps basketball program, the theme of hard work and a focus on improvement isn’t an underlying message, but a highlight and expected outcome. 

“Some of it comes down to ‘do you want to have a good team or do you want to have a good program?’,” Williams said. “When you’re starting over from scratch, it’s a little different from going into a spring where you maybe need to sign two or four guys. It’s just an ongoing deal.”

The Terps will rely on two different blends this season: the mesh of previous schools and playing styles and the union of veteran experience and fresh and hungry talent. 

“I’ve seen a lot of growth with the younger guys,” Saunders said. “Coming together through the summer and the workouts have helped them all gel to the system.”

“I think everybody has their own game coming from different schools,” freshman Jaziah Harper said. “They shed a lot of light to help the freshmen a lot. I think an area I stood up in was our preseason workouts. We weren’t touching any basketballs yet, but it was just about having each other’s back. I think everyone on this team can support one another in one way or another.”

It’ll be a season full of learning and rhythm, but a season that the Terps are ready to stay grounded and united through. 

“I think we’ll take everything step by step, game by game,” Payne said. “Just staying where our feet are is something that we harp on every single day.”

Basketball season is back and while there aren’t many familiar faces in this season’s edition of Maryland hoops, the standard and expectation for success will be buzzing through the start of the Williams era in College Park.