"Tyree Evans would be playing here now," Williams said. "You know, they're all qualified to play at other schools. So that's part of it. In basketball, one player is a lot. It's not like football where you have 25 every year."
Williams later said of Gilchrist and Evans: "It wasn't my fault that they're not here. That was somebody else's call."
Evans is averaging 12.8 points for Kent State.
Williams has a reputation for molding talent. Maryland's national championship team was not composed of blue-chip athletes but rather of players who needed seasoning. Steve Blake couldn't get a scholarship to North Carolina State, Juan Dixon redshirted as a freshman and Lonny Baxter started slowly his first season.
But Maryland did once lure players such as Chris Wilcox and Steve Francis, who turned out to be NBA lottery picks. For years, the Terps were aided by having a trio of assistant coaches - Jimmy Patsos, Billy Hahn and Dave Dickerson - who had been in College Park long enough to develop dozens of valuable recruiting contacts, as well as chemistry with Williams and each other.
Hahn, now an assistant at West Virginia, was at Maryland for 12 years. Patsos, the Loyola head coach, was with Williams for 13 years. Dickerson, the head man at Tulane, spent nine years under Williams.
"When you can keep a staff together for a long time, there is continuity and everybody knows their roles and their strengths and weaknesses," Hahn said yesterday. "I think staff continuity is very important. If you see turnovers in staffs, you usually see a drop-off. Duke had a drop-off when they lost Mike Brey and Quin Snyder."
Current Maryland assistants Chuck Driesell, Keith Booth and Robert Ehsan began their current posts in 2006, 2004 and 2008, respectively.
Williams said it speaks well of his programs that so many of his assistants - including Washington Wizards head coach Ed Tapscott and University of Vermont coach Mike Lonergan - are former Williams assistants.
Williams is credited by many basketball experts with getting the most out of teams.
"Coaching-wise, he is one of the best in the country," said Keith Stevens, who heads Team Takeover, an Amateur Athletic Union program in the Washington area.
Stevens continued: "In recruiting, Gary may be just a little old-school. Once upon a time, you could rely on your assistants going out and building relationships. Today, [kids] want to have a relationship with a head coach who is calling the shots. I think he's realizing he's got to get out there with his assistants. The recruiting starts so early now."
