Pharrel Payne’s return may grab the biggest spotlight around Maryland men’s basketball, but the deeper story is in the backcourt. Buzz Williams rebuilt that group with a wave of portal additions and freshmen, then paired them with two returners to give the Terps a rotation that looks packed with options.
Williams brought in five guards over the offseason to replace what Maryland lost in the backcourt, and the early returns have already shown up in public exhibition play. In two preseason games, the guards combined for 31 of Maryland’s 45 first-half points against Georgia Tech. With half the roster listed as guards, Williams has plenty to sort through, but that kind of depth is exactly the kind of problem a coach wants.
Andre Mills remains the key scoring piece. He was one of Maryland’s few bright spots in an otherwise rough 2025-26 season, finishing at 12.2 points per game and doing most of his damage after Payne’s season-ending injury.
Over the final 13 games, Mills hit double figures 11 times and averaged nearly 18 points a night. He also had the biggest scoring eruption of the season, dropping 39 points against Northwestern on 12-for-17 shooting.
Williams pointed to Mills’ efficiency as a work in progress at Big Ten Media Day.
“Some of the things that he did for us were incredibly good, but also somewhat inefficient,” Williams said. “But it was because we were asking him to do something that he really wasn’t quite prepared for.”
That part of the game has looked cleaner so far. Mills made three of five first-half shots against Georgia Tech and finished with 26 points while shooting 60% from the field as Maryland rallied.
Though he’s listed at 6-foot-4, his burst and creativity around the rim kept him on the highlight reel last season. Those tools also helped his perimeter game open up - he shot 34% from three and hit four triples in the West Virginia exhibition.
Last season, Mills was asked to carry the ball-handling load and much of the scoring burden. That won’t be his job this year, but he still profiles as Maryland’s top scoring guard.
DJ Wagner, the Arkansas transfer, is expected to run the offense and start alongside Mills. He isn’t a pure scorer - his only double-digit scoring season came as a sophomore - but he brings poise with the ball that Maryland lacked a year ago. Wagner has already piled up a team-high seven assists in two preseason games, and Williams was quick to praise the way he sees the floor.
“If you counted hockey assists in basketball, he led Xfinity in hockey assists today,” Williams said after the West Virginia exhibition. “He was throwing that ball across half court, and it was completely changing the pace in the second half.”
Mike McNair Jr. gives the Terps another important piece, especially after last season’s issues from deep. Maryland finished with the fourth-worst 3-point percentage in the Big Ten despite taking the fifth-most attempts.
McNair should help fix that. At Boston University last season, he shot 44.4% from three, the fifth-best mark in the country, and he has missed only two of his eight attempts so far.
There’s more depth behind them, too. Tennessee transfer Bishop Boswell has been limited to eight minutes because of injury precaution, but he looks like a player who can matter off the bench. He averaged 6.2 points, 4.4 rebounds and 3.1 assists in 26 minutes last season, and his defense stood out as he finished second on the team with 41 steals, trailing only former Terp Ja’Kobi Gillespie.
“A guy that can have the ball in his hands and make plays for myself and others. A guy that kind of sets the tone on defense as well,” Boswell said.
Boswell started 33 games last season for an Elite Eight team, which gives Williams another experienced backcourt option. Freshman Kaden House is also in the mix and should help the second unit. The four-star recruit scored in double figures in preseason and produced 10 of Maryland’s 15 bench points against West Virginia, while also recording two steals in his unofficial debut.
Further down the bench, Maban Jabriel brings a different kind of profile. The Queens University transfer stands 6-foot-9, the same size as forwards Payne and Tomislav Buljan, but his game is built around the perimeter. He took only 87 of his 198 shots from inside the arc last season and made 43.2% of his 3-pointers, a rate that would have tied for 15th nationally.
Guillermo Del Pino is one of the two returning guards and spent most of last season in a limited role, averaging just under nine minutes with two starts. His freshman year had its ups and downs, but the 6-foot-5 Spanish point guard gives Williams another lengthy ball handler if needed.
Del Pino finished with 12 assists and 16 rebounds last season, though he also committed 14 turnovers in 24 appearances. He isn’t expected to play a major role, but he did briefly appear in the first exhibition game and made an impact.
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