The Mike Locksley era at Maryland will be remembered for his leadership in the aftermath of a program tragedy and guiding an upward progression to three-straight bowl victories.
It also will be noted for his Terrapins’ inability to win when it mattered most, a chronic detriment that eventually became too glaring to ignore.
Locksley was fired Wednesday by athletic director Jim Smith, who publicly backed the coach in a letter to fans less than a year ago.
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“I am confident that we have the right foundation in place, the enhanced resources that position us to compete at a higher level in 2026, and a coach who can truly own the DMV,” Smith wrote in his Nov. 16, 2025 note. “Every decision we’ve made reflects our belief in this program’s potential and its leadership. We are fully committed to getting this right.”
Since that writing, Maryland is 2-7, and Smith will now be committing to get it right with someone of his own choosing, his first major hire since starting the job 15 months ago.
“Our immediate responsibility is to provide stability for our players and ensure they have the resources, guidance and support they need,” Smith said in announcing Locksley’s dismissal. “They have continued to represent Maryland with determination, and our entire department will stand behind them as we begin this next chapter.”
Locksley told ESPN he met with Smith on Sunday — the same day the coach fired defensive coordinator Ted Monachino — and packed up his office Wednesday evening. Smith announced his decision Wednesday morning.
“To be honest I kind of knew it was coming, just didn’t know when,” Locksley told ESPN’s Heather Dinich Thursday. “I’m not mad about leaving. I’m not. I’m at peace with it because I know it’s better than what it was when I got here. A player died right before I got here and this place was burnt to the ground.”
When Locksley took over at Maryland in 2019, he helped stabilize a program that was still reeling in the wake of what happened to Jordan McNair. A sophomore offensive lineman from Randallstown, McNair collapsed due to heat-related complications at a practice in May 2018. He would die two weeks later, and investigations into the circumstances surrounding his treatment and the culture of the program eventually led to the departures of then-coach D.J. Durkin and university President Wallace Loh.
Locksley stepped into that void and hit the ground running in his first season, with a 2-0 start and a ranked win over Syracuse earning Maryland the No. 21 spot in that year’s Week 3 poll.
Perhaps somewhat appropriately, his initial campaign portended how things would end. Maryland would crumble the rest of 2019, finishing 1-9 and leaving that ranking as the last time UMD appeared in a poll, currently the fourth-longest drought among Power Four teams.
Eight seasons later, he leaves Maryland in a similar slide. The Terrapins are on a five game losing streak, losers of 13 of their last 15 games and one of only five Power Four programs this season to not have a win over another P4 opponent.
In between, Locksley showed what the program could aspire to. Winning three-straight bowls from 2012-23 — the Pinstripe, Duke’s Mayo and Music City — was a program first. So too were all the records shattered by quarterback Taulia Tagovailoa, who became not only Maryland’s statistical leader in every major passing category but also the Big Ten’s all-time passing yards leader.
Tagovailoa and many others were demonstrations of Locksley’s best strength: his recruiting prowess. Maryland’s incoming classes continued to rise up the rankings as Locksley’s tenure went on.
But Locksley was unable to bridge the success from the Tagovailoa era to today due to both a lack of adaptation and staffing decisions.
At a time when Maryland had just revamped its football facilities, including completing the Jones-Hill House early in Locksley’s tenure, the tide of name, image and likeness payments began to dominate the sport, leaving UMD behind.
Add in a revolving door of coordinators — four in the last five seasons on offense as Locksley struggled to find innovative minds to run his scheme and a dip on defense after Brian Williams left in early 2025 after three-plus seasons as coordinator — and Maryland was behind the eight ball for the final years of his era.
“Stabilized it, went to three bowls, NIL kicks in, and wasn’t prepared for it,” Locksley told ESPN. “The hardest thing I dealt with here was not recruiting players — it’s being able to get the right coaches and assistants with me … For whatever reason, I struggled to keep the really good coaches I had because we win, we were having success, and people come hire them. I was not able to keep consistency with the staff. And then NIL hit.”
Locksley finished 38-49 at Maryland and 16-47 in Big Ten play. He never won a signature league game, finishing 0-21 against ranked Big Ten opponents and failing to ever beat Ohio State and Michigan, division rivals for most of UMD’s time in the league. The Terrapins never finished with a .500 or better record in conference play, including a 2-20 mark in his final two-plus seasons.
Arguably no one will ever have the pride in the program that Locksley, a southeast D.C. native who once said he used to sneak into Maryland games as a kid, did. His departure has been as positive as can be from his perspective given the circumstances, including posting a montage video on his Instagram with highlights of his players and games along with the slogan that defined the early part of his tenure: The Best Is Ahead.
But for a coach who once announced that Maryland had arrived “to compete for Big Ten championships,” the negative side of his tenure will be remembered for that lack of conference success.
“It’s actually not hard to win at Maryland,” Locksley told ESPN. “It’s hard to win consistently at Maryland.”
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