Jordan Williams

Chances are Maryland forward Jordan Williams will hear his name called at some point during Thursday night’s NBA draft, though you might already be in bed by the time it happens. The majority of NBA draft experts have Williams, who was named all-ACC first team as a sophomore, pegged as a second-round pick . “Williams was one of the best rebounders in college basketball last season -- but he was a bit on the flabby side. He showed strength and toughness in the paint, but his lack of explosive leaping ability and conditioning were major issues,” wrote ESPN’s Chad Ford, who has Williams ranked as his No. 48 prospect in the 2011 draft . “Williams might be slightly undersized for a center (he measured 6-8 3/4 in socks, 6-10 in shoes at Impact)

Baltimore Sun reporters Jeff Barker and Don Markus and editor Matt Bracken weigh in on the three biggest topics of the past week in Maryland sports. Maryland finalized the elimination of seven athletic teams, but managed to preserve men's outdoor track through private fundraising . Any chance that some of these sports will return in the future? Jeff Barker: Schools do occasionally bring back sports as budget numbers or other circumstances change. Villanova once eliminated - then restored - football.

The Washington Wizards were one of several teams that Maryland center Jordan Williams has worked out for as he runs the gamut before the June 23 NBA draft, and after Tuesday’s workout at Verizon Center, he said he has a hectic schedule the next couple of weeks as he tries to improve his draft stock. Williams told The Baltimore Sun that he decided to enter the draft after he left College Park in March to attend a basketball camp in Las Vegas. After a few weeks, he was convinced his game was NBA-ready . "I went to the camp with the mindset, 'I think I'm ready, but I know I've got to prove it,’" said Williams, who has dropped 19 pounds.

Bob Ferry could spend his days on the deck of his Annapolis home that looks out onto the Chesapeake Bay, but he's not big on sitting still. He gave up boating when his three kids left the house and stopped playing basketball more than five years ago, at age 69, after he tore his rotator cuff. He and his wife of nearly 52 years, Rita, dote on their eight grandchildren, but on many of their visits, Ferry finds himself watching a basketball game on television. So why not continue doing what he has been paid to do for most of the past 45 years, which is evaluate NBA prospects?

Maryland big man Jordan Williams is leaving College Park. The sophomore more or less confirmed on his Twitter account this afternoon the reports that he has hired an agent and is going pro, something that has been speculated the past several weeks. That’s right, order your Bakersfield Jam jerseys now, folks, because Williams is going to the D-League! Just kidding. Williams is entering the June 23 NBA draft , though I guess a season in the NBA’s Development League isn’t out of the question depending on which team drafts him next month.

Josh Selby wasn't concerned about a potential NBA lockout. He wasn't concerned about the underwhelming, injury-plagued year he had at Kansas. The former Lake Clifton star was dead set on going to the NBA, and he isn't overly concerned with where he lands in the draft so long as he gets selected. "I have a motto — it's not really where you start, it's where you finish," Selby said at the NBA pre-draft camp Thursday. But with a looming lockout inserting uncertainty into this year's draft, where you start is pretty important too, given that first-round contracts provide guaranteed money.

Maryland entered Sunday's game 2-8 in games decided by single digits. So forgive Terps fans if Maryland's 87-80 victory over N.C. State was a bit unsettling in the final minutes. Jordan Williams scored 26 points on 10-for-12 from the floor and Dino Gregory had a career-high 18 points to lead Maryland. Freshman guard Terrell Stoglin, who started along with fellow freshman Pe'Shon Howard, matched the career high of 25 points he set in Maryland's previous game against Virginia Tech.

After a workout with the Washington Wizards on Tuesday morning, former Terps big man Jordan Williams said that ESPN’s Scott Van Pelt, a Maryland grad, was among those who advised him while he mulled over entering the NBA draft. Van Pelt “was a big factor in helping me make my decision,” Williams said. “Just giving me feedback, what he thought about it. Just trying to make me make the right decision,” Williams told The Washington Post’s Steve Yanda. “He did a great job, and I give him a lot of credit for going out of his way. … He's a really busy guy, so for him to go out of his way to do that is unbelievable .”  If Van Pelt really did steer Williams to the pros -- even if he was doing it in the player’s best interest -- it won’t go over well with Maryland supporters.

I hope Jordan Williams isn't making a huge mistake. He's a great kid. And I hope he goes to the NBA and tears it up next season. But if you ask me if he's ready to compete with the best basketball players in the world over an 82-game grind, not counting the never-ending playoffs, my answer is no. One more year at College Park could have changed that. On the other hand, I know this will shock you: Williams, Maryland's leading scorer and rebounder as a sophomore last year, never asked for my opinion about declaring for the NBA draft.

Former Maryland center Jordan Williams arrived at Verizon Center Tuesday with a trim new body (19 pounds lighter), a new position (forward) and an explanation for Terps basketball fans on how and why he left the team after his sophomore season to pursue an NBA career. Williams, wearing a light-blue Washington Wizards practice jersey and navy blue shorts, was among six NBA hopefuls to sweat through a series of drills for Wizards coaches 16 days before the draft. Apparently, it wasn't only the weight that Williams wanted to lose.

Deron Williams scored 19 points and had 13 assists as the New Jersey Nets sent the visiting Washington Wizards to their fifth straight loss. Williams, who didn't play in Wednesday's loss to Portland because of a stomach virus, led five New Jersey players who scored in double figures. The Nets never trailed and built a 15-point lead in the first quarter. New Jersey's biggest advantage was 24 late in the fourth, as it won consecutive home games for the first time this season.

Sophomore guard Terrell Stoglin tweeted today that he's returning for another year at College Park . That's great news for Stoglin's development, but is it great news for the Terps? Stoglin gradually grew on me this season. At the beginning of the year I posted a blog about whether Stoglin was going to become the next Greivis Vasquez or the next John Gilchrist. At the time, I thought he was leaning toward Gilchrist - a talented player who thought he was better than he really was and would bring an average Maryland team down.

I wrote two stories for tomorrow's paper about Maryland sophomore Terrell Stoglin. I had been wanting to learn more about what kind of guy Terrell is, and whether he was assured of returning for his junior season. He's obviously a versatile scorer - tough, intense, rarely in doubt - and he has taken an almost unprecedented percentage of the team's shots this season. He accounts for slightly more than 30 percent of Maryland's field-goal attempts this season, which places him historically in a small group of Terps who really liked to shoot it. I looked into this bit of hoops history with John McNamara of the Annapolis Capital.

 Coaching changes are not only good for college basketball programs, they are good for players. If the retirement of Gary Williams and the hiring of Mark Turgeon has helped reinvigorate the Terps when it comes to recruiting, it has also benefited junior forward James Padgett more than any other player. Maybe Padgett would have emerged after two disappointing years if Williams was still in College Park, but listening to Padgett talk earlier this season and watching him perform for the past month leads to me to believe that Turgeon has much to do with the leap Maryland's hardest-working player has taken from a bust to an offensive-rebounding beast.

James Padgett came to Maryland three years with a reputation as a voracious rebounder and defender, the guy who did all the dirty work for Lance Stephenson at a Brooklyn basketball factory known as Lincoln High School. That image eroded during Padgett's first two seasons in College Park, when classmate Jordan Williams became a star and Padgett became mostly a cheerleader on the bench. When he got a chance to play, Padgett looked scared. Turns out, he was. Without making any direct references to his former coach, Gary Williams, Padgett said that the difference he feels under Mark Turgeon is "being able to make mistakes.

Know this about Mark Turgeon: He has no reservations, absolutely none, about replacing Gary Williams, the man who resurrected Maryland basketball. If Turgeon was the type to be cowed by a challenge, he would never have tried to play point guard for mighty Kansas as a short, scrawny teenager with braces on his teeth. He would never have left his comfortable job as an NBA assistant to become head coach at Jacksonville State in rural Alabama, which had just finished 308th out of 309 Division I men's teams.

Jimmy Patsos, who spent 13 years under Gary Williams and had just spoken to him Tuesday, didn't see it coming. Neither did former players Johnny Rhodes or Duane Simpkins. And when Fang Mitchell found out Thursday that Williams was retiring after 22 years as Maryland's basketball coach, the Coppin State coach winced. "Oh, no, did he really? I'm upset with that. He's a major loss," Mitchell said. When cell phones, text messages and phone calls delivered Thursday's news, the area's basketball community recoiled in shock and disbelief.

Jordan Williams, a power forward who has signed to play at Maryland, had a double double in Torrington's 39-38 win over Lyman Hall in the Connecticut Class L semifinals. (For more, go to baltimoresun.com/ recruiting)

By the time Berend Weijs was done last March with a frustrating junior season at Maryland, he knew something had to change before he took the court this season for new coach Mark Turgeon. At 6 feet 10 and 200 pounds last season, Weijs was the kind of skinny dude that gets knocked around and beat up in the Atlantic Coast Conference. He simply didn't have the girth to hang in the low post. He spent the offseason getting cozy with a few of his favorite fatty, high-calorie munchies — and still managed to put on just 10 pounds of muscle.

Midnight Madness, I mean Maryland Madness, has been scheduled for Friday, Oct. 14 at 9:30 p.m. The event will be held at soon-to-be-but-not-quite-yet Gary Williams Court at Comcast Center. According to Maryland media relations, "The event will mark the 40th anniversary of the first Midnight Madness, which began on the Maryland campus when former head coach Lefty Driesell took his squad to the track at Byrd Stadium for a midnight conditioning run. " The event will feature scrimmages by the men's and women's teams.