It's been a while since Maryland has won a game against a Power 4 opponent.
More than a calendar year, in fact. The Terps won 27-10 at Wisconsin on Sept. 20, 2025, to move to 4-0 on the year, and then didn't win again. After victories over Hampton and UConn to open this season, Maryland lost to former head-coach-in-waiting James Franklin in his third game leading former ACC bunk mate Virginia Tech.
Head coach Mike Locksley has generated good times in his seven-plus seasons in College Park, winning bowl games annually from 2021-23, but he's 2-16 in Big Ten play over the past two seasons and, now, on the wrong end of his last nine games against the Power 4.
At his press conference on Tuesday, Locksley was asked, essentially, why he deserves to keep his job after pledging so many times before to get things right, lose, and then come back and pledge again to get things right. Watch the whole exchange below.
Asked Michael Locksley if he believes he deserves more chances to keep *saying* he’s going to learn from losses while rarely actually doing so.
— Taylor Lyons (@taylorjlyons) September 22, 2026
Here’s the back and forth. Tried following up but a Maryland PR staffer took the mic out of my hand and Locksley did not look at me. pic.twitter.com/WEJ2x4T0KQ
"I understand why you ask the question," Locksley said. "I understand why the fans are frustrated. They've earned the right for us to play better than we have. It won't get fixed here at the podium, it'll get fixed across the street with the work we do. We continue to do the work, we continue to improve, we'll continue to do the things we have to do to earn their trust back."
The theory of the Locksley hire was that he could leverage his local connections and lessons from his years at Nick Saban's side to build an upper-middle-class Big Ten program. Beating Ohio State, Michigan and Penn State would be nice but not mandatory (the Terps have beaten the Nittany Lions twice, Wolverines once, and are still looking for their first victory over the Buckeyes), but beating the Purdues, Illinoises and Northwesterns would happen on a regular basis. That has stopped happening. Last year, Maryland lost to a 3-9 UCLA, a 5-7 Rutgers, a 4-8 Michigan State, and a 7-6 Nebraska.
Locksley's team gets a revenge shot at home against UCLA on Saturday (1:30 p.m. ET, BTN), and later dates with Nebraska, Rutgers, Illinois, Purdue and Wisconsin before closing with USC and Penn State. Win four of those six and Locksley will likely calm the waters, at least enough. Fail to do that, and it'll be more than just a single reporter wondering why things aren't getting fixed.