Maryland is expected to soon announce that it is filling its assistant men's basketball coach opening with Orlando "Bino" Ranson, a Xavier assistant with deep Baltimore ties, according to officials with knowledge of the hiring.
Ranson, 35, was in College Park on Monday talking to the basketball staff. He has previously worked at James Madison, Marist and Loyola.
Before that, he played and coached the junior varsity at Baltimore's St. Frances Academy and founded an AAU program in the city.
His Baltimore and AAU ties are considered important recruiting assets as Maryland tries to keep the best local high school talent from leaving the state.
"I think Bino is a good fit for the situation at Maryland," said Williams Wells, the St. Frances boys coach from 1979 through 2008 who coached Ranson. "He can have a true contact not only with the Baltimore area, but the whole East Coast. Bino comes around a lot to support the kids and the different high school coaches."
Ranson's Xavier biography says: "Among the players Ranson worked with at the AAU level have been Massachusetts' Ricky Harris, Pittsburgh's Jermaine Dixon, Maryland's Juan Dixon (later with the NBA's Detroit Pistons) and Sean Mosley, and Syracuse's Donte Green (later with the NBA's Sacramento Kings)."
Ranson, a proflific scorer at Southern New Hampshire -- he graduated in 1999 -- will join a staff that includes Keith Booth and Robert Ehsan.
An announcement was expected by Maryland this week, said one official who declined to be named until the hiring was official.
Ranson will replace Chuck Driesell, who left to take over the program at The Citadel. Driesell had been at the school for four years.
