2020 Maryland Terrapins Football Preview

To attribute such jeering Who lyrics to one Maryland head football coach, Mike Locksley, may be mildly unfair. He, at least on the surface, is far more like-able than Randy Edsall ever was, the culture he is building around the program seems slightly nontoxic, and his last name isn’t a direct nod to the United States biggest foreign threat.

Can the man recruit? By Maryland standards, hell yeah! Is the man loved by players and seemingly all local football figures? I guess so! Can he overcome potential and current player attrition, and use the talent he has at his disposal to win actual football games? In 2020....hell no, in the near future...my skepticism remains on high alert.

What We Brought to the Table in 2019:

Well, if Maryland Football were to attend one of those famous OTE potlucks, but in a more literal sense of the word, I would say we brought a warm bowl of Sam’s Choice Taquitos to the table, all while chowing down on all of the real food all of you other suckers brought (i.e. Shared Big Ten TV Revenue...LOL, THANKS IDIOTS!)

Maryland won three games in 2019 and lost some other total of games. In those three glorious moments of triumph, Maryland outscored their lofty competition by a total of several touchdowns to several less touchdowns. This still however was not enough for the National Committee for the Advancement of Analytics (NCAA) to deem Maryland worthy enough to attend the all-hallowed mid-December bowl season. Oh how I weep at night as I reflect on missed opportunities to purchase over-priced, poorly designed bowl t-shirts. My goodness how I pine for an ill fitting white tee, Maryland’s logo on one breast, Florida Atlantic’s on the other, with an enormous logo for some arbitrary cherry drink plastered on the back. Seriously y’all, what the fuck is Cheribundi?!

The Road Ahead:

Sep 5: vs. Towson Tigers

Sep 12: vs. Northern Illinois Huskies

Sep 19: at West Virginia Mountaineers

Oct 3: vs. Minnesota Golden Gophers

Oct 10: at Indiana Hoosiers

Oct 17: at Northwestern Wildcats

Oct 24: vs. Wisconsin Badgers

Oct 31: vs. Rutgers Scarlet Knights

Nov 7: at Michigan Wolverines

Nov 14: vs. Ohio State Buckeyes

Nov 21: at Penn State Nittany Lions

Nov 28: vs. Michigan State Spartans

This is the first time I have realized Maryland and Rutgers are playing on Halloween. THE HORROR! I hear that if you watch it, you’ll get a phone call from Chris Ash and seven days later a turd will crawl out of your television and consume you whole.

Best Case Scenario: Maryland beats Towson, we hope Northern Illinois and WVU remain mediocre and we sweep the non-con. We win the annual coin-toss versus Indiana (I am alluding to all the games being close, not Maryland winning 50% of them, so keep your cocky Hoosier mouths shut!) Northwestern remains garbage and Maryland wins consecutive road conference games (LOL). Rutgers. Then we pretend Maryland is due for some sort of upset and we grab a game in November. Record: 7-5, we celebrate in the streets by spraying each other with cherry drank.

Worst Case Scenario: Only conference games get played, Maryland beats Rutgers, we drown our sorrows in cherry drank. Josh Jackson transfers back to Virginia Tech and Mike Locksley copyrights a new pun-tastic hashtag to further promote his ‘brand’. #MikeCocksley

Silver Linings Scenario: There is no college football season at all, all 14 teams erect statues outside their football stadiums to commemorate an undefeated 2020 season. I am not 100% convinced that Penn State wouldn’t actually do this. #NoGamesRequired.

Players to Watch

Offense: Maryland has a handful of players on their roster that identify themselves as Quarterbacks. Returning senior Josh Jackson, and redshirt Freshman Lance the Legendre. I imagine both will see significant playing time this season, and I imagine both will put forth their best efforts. We also snagged the lesser Tagovailoa via the portal, but I don’t even know if he is eligible to play because I am an idiot. Oh, and we musn’t forget about Maryland legend Eric Najarian...seriously, someone tell me who Eric Najarian is.

We have a solid core of WRs in Jeshaun Jones, Dontay Demus Jr., DJ Turner, and for some reason unbeknownst to me, incoming 5-star freshman Rakim Jarrett. Will our quarterbacks be able to throw them the ball? Will our offensive line give them time to throw the ball? Doubtful. Running back Tayon Fleet-Davis could also be okay.

Defense: There are a handful of decent individual pieces on the defensive side of the ball for the Terrapins, but I imagine overall it will be just as terrible as ever against any reasonably talented competition. Players to be on the look out for are DB Nick Cross and LB Shaq Smith.

Special Teams: Maryland made .167 field goals per game and punted 6.25 times per game last year. Look for both numbers to creep up ever so slightly this year.

The Week Ahead

Monday: This

Tuesday: Who knows, tacos maybe?

Wednesday: Crab cakes and beer, that’s what Maryland does.

Thursday: Obligatory Mark Turgeon criticism.

Friday: Old Bay sucks, the Maryland Flag sucks, your traffic sucks, your North/South identity crisis sucks, Maryland is just a big bowl of suckage.