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Brendan Looney's former coaches mourn the loss of "the best of the best"

The phone rang just once before Navy lacrosse coach Richie Meade picked it up. Just one more discussion in arguably the toughest week of the lives of those who knew Brendan Looney.

The former Navy defenseman was one of 10 U.S. service members killed in a helicopter crash in Afghanistan last month. His funeral is today, followed by burial at Arlington National Cemetery.

"It's hard to talk about it," Meade said.

It wasn't that Looney was Meade's first former player killed in action. Rather, it was the person lost in the process.

The oldest of three brothers, all of whom played for Navy in the last decade, was part of the Mids' 2004 team that reached the national title game.

"He was the best of the best for so many reasons in an unassuming way," former Navy assistant John Tillman said.

Looney's younger brothers, Steve and Billy, eventually enjoyed All-America-caliber careers. Brendan, though, was a crucial component on the team that revitalized Navy's program.

"We had a great team, but there's no doubt Brendan Looney was the toughest man on that team," Meade said. "That's not to slight anybody else. There were a lot of great men on that team. But he was our Achilles. He wasn't the best player. He wasn't a lot of things, but he was who he was. That is the toughest thing to me. Somebody told me 'Brendan loved you,' and that's like elevating me. Brendan would have loved anybody who was his coach because that's who Brendan was. When you were around him, you just felt OK."

Tillman, an assistant at Navy during Looney's career who is now Maryland's head coach, remembered when Looney first started playing. He was a member of the Mids' football team when he first arrived in college, and with at least one brother on the way to Annapolis opted to begin playing lacrosse.

As a college sophomore.

Tillman said the initial returns on the field were what would be expected. But Looney's work ethic helped make everyone around him better, and he eventually worked his way into a solid player in Navy's complex defensive scheme.

"I can't see anybody doing what he did," Tillman said. "Today in lacrosse, you can't not play and pick up the game in college anymore. That's just amazing, but that's just him. He made the hard things for other people seem workable and attainable because he had drive and determination."

In the midst of his senior season, Meade and Tillman remembered how much the three brothers savored being on the field together for a single faceoff --- Billy at the X, Steve and Brendan on the wings. It was a lacrosse highlight, but not the most indicative moment of his career.

Instead, it was everyday instances, each further revealing traits that so impressed Meade as a coach and ensured Brendan Looney would thrive after leaving the academy.

That meant transferring from the Navy's intelligence community to its SEAL program --- and finishing at the top of his qualification training class.

"Brendan wasn't tough; Brendan was ferocious," Meade said. "He was a great athlete. He was mentally one of the toughest --- if not in that category of guys who are so tough you can't even describe them --- and so competitive. Brendan didn't have a choice. He was going to be a SEAL because that's as high as you can go here competitively."

But lacrosse always remained part of his life --- and kept him tied to Navy's program. During a blustery February evening earlier this year, a t-shirt-clad Looney watched the Mids play North Carolina at Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium.

Meade offered his old player a jacket, figuring it couldn't be pleasant standing around in frigid conditions. Looney declined, offering a knowing look in the process. Meade got it: Looney would face more inhospitable things down the road, and shrug them off just like the cold.

"That's the hardest thing," Tillman said. "You see this guy who was indestructible and you knew one-on-one, no one would take that guy down. Nobody was going to stop that guy. He had this mental toughness and physical toughness and also was really smart. The only way things [could go wrong] was if he was not in control of the situation."

Meade promised that Looney would always be part of Navy's program as a standard for all players to shoot for throughout their careers. It will be a difficult ideal to match.

Or to forget. Meade held back tears several times in a half-hour discussion. He talked about practices, about Looney teaching fellow SEALs how to play lacrosse when they weren't on assignment in Afghanistan, about his former player's devotion to family.

And how the future just won't be quite the same.

"I told my wife that I don't have any bravado over this; we've got to move on, have to come to work after this, and that's all going to happen," Meade said. "But I'm never getting over this. It's not about me. The reason I'm never going to get over it --- and I'll think of him every day until I die --- is it's always difficult when somebody dies like this so early in life. What you think about is some little boy or little girl is never going to have Brendan Looney as his or her father. And he would be good. He'd be a better father than me. Those are the types of things, the immediate-impact things, you think about that make it so difficult."

Inside Lacrosse announces 2011 pro stadium events

Georgetown, Johns Hopkins, UMBC and Virginia are among the lacrosse teams included in two tripleheaders hosted by Inside Lacrosse next season.

Perhaps most notable is the the events --- March 12 at Baltimore's M&T Bank Stadium and April 3 at the New Meadowlands Stadium in East Rutherford, N.J. --- feature different matchups than in previous years.

First up, the schedules:

March 12, Baltimore

Georgetown vs. Syracuse, 11 a.m.
Cornell vs. Virginia, 1:30 p.m.
Johns Hopkins vs. UMBC, 4 p.m.

April 3, East Rutherford, N.J.

Rutgers vs. St. John's, 1 p.m.
Johns Hopkins vs. North Carolina, 4 p.m.
Duke vs. Syracuse, 6:30 p.m.

Five quick thoughts on these matchups:

1. Cornell, Georgetown and UMBC have yet to be a part of one of these events. It's good to see some new names on a big regular season stage --- especially Cornell, which has made the NCAA semifinals three times in four years (and did play in a doubleheader in Foxborough last April).

2. A Duke-Syracuse regular season game is fantastic. Fans can only hope this isn't a year too late, since the Blue Devils lost two classes of seniors from their national title team.

3. Virginia's trip to Baltimore will be less tense than its last one. Mainly because it has to be, since the Cavaliers were last at M&T Bank Stadium when former midfielder George Huguely's arrest in connection with the death of Yeardley Love was a defining national story. It's no less of a tragedy now, but there won't be quite so much scrutiny when Virginia visits Charm City in March.

4. The games not listed here are just as important. Hopkins-Princeton, Maryland-Duke, Virginia-North Carolina, Hofstra-Delaware, Army-Navy and Maryland-Hopkins all move back to campus this season. As Syracuse-Virginia showed the last couple years, an added bonus of playing in these events for a couple years is also a greater appreciation for rivalry games when they are not played at neutral sites.

5. Mid-March will work better for the Face-Off Classic. True, it technically isn't the start of the season. But the odds of getting mild weather are probably better on March 12 than Feb. 28 (which is when the event was held in 2009). That's a plus for both fans and organizers, even if it now lands on the eve of college basketball's Selection Sunday.

NCAA awards lacrosse final four to Philadelphia in '13, Baltimore in '14

Interesting developments today out of Indianapolis, where the NCAA has announced future sites for the lacrosse final four --- as well as a set of quarterfinal hosts.

The final four will return to Philadelphia in 2013, its first stop in the city since Virginia completed a perfect season in 2006 with a defeat of Massachusetts. It will be the third final four hosted by the city since the NCAA went to pro stadiums.

Meanwhile, Baltimore will host the 2014 event at M&T Bank Stadium. Baltimore also hosted in 2003, 2004, 2007 and 2010 and will again be home to the event next year.

That means the future sites are effectively a rotation between the three pro stadiums that have already welcomed multiple final fours:

2011: Baltimore
2012: Foxborough
2013: Philadelphia
2014: Baltimore

The most notable item here is the absence of East Rutherford, N.J., and the new Giants Stadium.

Meanwhile, the 2012 quarterfinals will include a return to Annapolis' Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium on one day and a debut at PPL Park in Chester, Pa., on the other. The 2011 quarterfinal sites --- Hofstra and Foxborough --- were already announced.

This is another indication the NCAA is intent on avoiding postseason oversaturation in one area in a year.

Navy linebacker French knows the language of two sports

ANNAPOLIS --- Navy linebacker Brye French was behind, the product of playing lacrosse rather than going through spring practice.

But not for long.

The sophomore emerged as one of the standouts of the first two weeks of Navy's football camp, leaping from unlisted on the depth chart to a co-starter with Aaron McCauley at outside linebacker.

"It's not a surprise, because we thought we saw that early on," coach Ken Niumatalolo said. "There's some guys that are rep guys and need to get a ton of reps. We've always felt that he had good football instincts and we're seeing that now."

But he's also a promising lacrosse player, having picked up both sports at an early age. The son of a retired Air Force officer, French was a standout in football and lacrosse while attending high school in Alabama.

Though the south isn't home to many traditional lacrosse hotbeds, French got to know Richie Meade through a camp the Navy coach ran. Meanwhile, football assistant Keith Jones began recruiting French for football.

Eventually, French went to the Naval Academy Prep School in a football slot with the understanding he would have the chance to play both in college.

He did as a freshman, appearing on special teams in four football games last year and picking up two tackles. In the spring, Meade found a place for French in the defensive midfield and, eventually, on the faceoff wing. French had three groundballs in Navy's Patriot League final loss to Army in May.

"He's not an athlete who plays lacrosse," Meade said. "He's a lacrosse player who is an athlete."

French, however, is also a football player. Days after the lacrosse season ended, he met with Niumatalolo to figure out what was required of him in the offseason to be ready to contribute once August arrived.

One big difference was reshaping his body. He played between 200 and 205 pounds in lacrosse --- on the low side for a linebacker, even at Navy.

"He said just put on weight but make sure you can run," said French, who is now around 217 pounds.

French took a couple days off after the lacrosse season, then became a weight room regular. He also returned to Annapolis early after a week at home and invested much of his available time in preparing for the season.

"We knew coming in that he was going to play both his first year," defensive coordinator Buddy Green said. "But he did a great job this summer studying video, [going through] summer workouts and getting himself ready to play this season and having a chance to compete in the depth chart. He did the things he had to do in the spring, summer and leading up to camp."

It's difficult to play both sports anywhere, but the demands of the academy make it even more strenuous. Meade recalled Joe Papetti, a second-team All-America pick in lacrosse in 1985, and 1999 football co-captain Jamie Doffermyre as somewhat recent examples of guys who managed to juggle both.

Now, it seems, French could join that list. Meade said French's future in lacrosse could be at the offensive end, but for now there's the matter of locking down a role with the Mids as an outside linebacker --- a spot Green considers one of the most mentally challenging positions on the defense.

"I'm blessed to be able to have the opportunity to jump up," French said. "I didn't think going in I'd move to striker and jump up quickly. It is a big shocker."

Meade acknowledged French's greatest asset was likely his coachability, and Green was particularly impressed that French could pick up so many concepts so quickly.

In the short term, French's intelligence gives him a better chance than most to make a difference despite spending a spring away from football. But in the long term, it might push off a decision French never wanted to make: Choosing one sport over the other.

"I started football and lacrosse at the same time and that was always my dream: To play football and lacrosse in college --- and actually play," French said. "I understand there's probably some choices that might have to be made. I just hope coaches and I, we can all work it out and [I'll] be able to play both."

Hopkins adds year to Pietramala's deal

A little bit of lacrosse housekeeping on a summer afternoon: Johns Hopkins extended Dave Pietramala's contract through 2016.

Considering he was extended a couple seasons through 2015 just a little less than 14 months ago, it's safe to presume this tacks on one year.

Since Hopkins is a private school, it's impossible to know the exact provisions in Pietramala's deal. But few coaches in the country should be as secure as Pietramala, who is 113-38 with two national titles and six final four appearances in 10 seasons. The titles were the first for the program since 1987.

The Blue Jays are coming off a 7-8 season, the first time since 1971 they produced a losing record. Hopkins won its final two regular-season games to become eligible for the NCAA tournament, then was hammered 18-5 in the first round by eventual national champ Duke.

So what does the extension say? It's a sign that despite some unrest from the extreme factions of the sport's most demanding fans, Hopkins knows it has a good thing with a meticulous, detail-oriented alum who understands the pressure-cooker of Homewood as well as anyone.

The Blue Jays might not be a national title contender in 2011, but it could be the building block to something bigger the next year. One thing is for sure: Pietramala will be part of it for some time to come.

Ex-Terp assistant Slafkosky "can't say enough" about new gig

Dave Slafkosky made it through one coaching change at Maryland. The longtime Maryland lacrosse assistant couldn't survive two.

But after a couple months on edge, a new chapter in the life of one of the sport's top defensive minds is about to begin: As a guidance counselor and lacrosse coach at Mount St. Joseph High School in Baltimore.

"I can't say enough," Slafkosky said today, just a few hours after signing a contract with the private school. "I think Mount St. Joe stepped up and as [former Maryland coach Dick Edell] said, they saw an opportunity and it worked out for me."

Slafkosky was an assistant under Edell at both Army and Maryland, and he remained the Terrapins' defensive coordinator throughout Dave Cottle's nine-year tenure. But when Cottle was ousted in May, Slafkosky found himself looking for work for the first time in decades.

Regardless of the criticism levied against Cottle, there was never reason to believe Slafkosky was a source of contention for fans. His unit yielded only 8.4 goals a game this season, and it figures to be just as good next season with all three close defense starters and pole Brian Farrell back.

Nonetheless, change is part of coaching. For most, there is far less than 27 years between switching jobs.

In that way, Slafkosky was fortunate. But there was still uncertainty about the future.

Two high school jobs attracted his attention. Archbishop Spalding and Mount St. Joseph both had openings, but neither had a full-time job available. A spring of coaching lacrosse was only a part-time gig.

But things soon changed. Two of Slafkosky's sons --- Kevin and Alex --- played at Mount St. Joseph, so he had more than a passing familiarity with the school.

"Luckily, my dad is a staunch Catholic, and when he heard Kevin wanted to go to Mount St. Joe, he said 'I'll split the costs with you,'" Slafkosky said. "That made a little bit more sense."

Things broke right again for the man known around College Park simply as Slaf. He talked with Washington College coach Jeff Shirk about serving as an assistant at the Division III school. But the 140-mile roundtrip commute to the Eastern Shore was daunting, even if it would have kept him in the college game.

Mount St. Joseph soon came through. The school wanted to create a position that emphasized guidance counseling --- with coaching thrown in.

Slafkosky might not have a traditional background for the primary work, but coaching for more than three decades at the college level provides a different but significant perspective for the job.

"I know a month ago, they didn't have anything," said Slafkosky, who earned a graduate degree in counseling from C.W. Post while he was working at Army. "Certain people saw a chance to get me and I'm kind of shocked, but I'm glad. I don't know if I could have been walking around two or three months ago without a job. Or six or seven months. It could be longer at my age."

Thanks to a school close to home, he won't have to worry about that at all.

DMV schools well-represented in Saturday's Under Armour lax game

The annual Under Armour All-America game --- basically, as big a deal as a high school lacrosse all-star game can be --- is Saturday at 8 p.m. at Towson's Johnny Unitas Stadium.

Of the 44 players invited, 16 are set to attend college in Maryland, Virginia or D.C.

Take the list for what it's worth --- it's high school all-stars, and while some of these guys will turn out to be names to know in May down the road, others might have more pedestrian careers.

At this point, it's impossible to know who will land in which category. But six schools contributed to this list.

GEORGETOWN

D John Urbank

JOHNS HOPKINS

D Tobias Armour
D Jack Reilly
G Eric Schneider
M Eric Ruhl

MARYLAND

D Mike Ehrhardt
A Rustin Bryant
D Emmett Cahill
M Brian Cooper
A Quinn Haley
D Casey Ikeda

STEVENSON

M Tony Rossi

TOWSON

M Andrew Hodgson

VIRGINIA

M Mark Cockerton
M Rob Emery
D Scott McWilliams

Finding winners and losers in wild lacrosse coaching week

Maryland has a new coach. A month ago, he'd have been a mild surprise.

Penn State has a new coach. A week ago, he'd have been a big surprise.

Cornell has a new coach. All along, he seemed like the next man in line.

Harvard is looking for a new coach for the second time in a three-year span.

Here's a look at who did well, who treaded water and who wound up losing now that college lacrosse's coaching carousel is near completion. 

WINNERS

* Penn State

Unquestionably, the school that came out furthest ahead in any of this was Penn State. The Nittany Lions have only two NCAA tournament appearances, and wound up landing Jeff Tambroni, a guy who took Cornell to three  final fours in the last four seasons. Penn State went after the biggest fish it could have hoped to have landed and pulled it off. The Nits might not be relevant immediately, but they simply couldn't have done any better.

* John Tillman

In a little more than 34 months, Tillman went from the top assistant at Navy to the head coach of a second-tier Ivy League program (Harvard) to the head coach at Maryland. Not bad. He received a seven-year contract with the Terps, so chances are good his second head coaching stint will be longer than his first.

* Ben DeLuca

The Cornell grad was next in line for the last few years, though it started to seem as if Tambroni would be in Ithaca for the long haul. DeLuca was pursued last year by Princeton, and that certainly would have been a great hire. Instead, he winds up stepping up from running the Big Red's defense to running the program. DeLuca had a hand in three final four teams, and it seemed only a matter of time before he got a team of his own. That it happens to be Cornell makes it even sweeter.

EVEN

* Jeff Tambroni

Tambroni told the Ithaca Journal his decision had much more to do with family --- his wife, Cornell's former field hockey coach and a Penn State grad, will have a chance to help with the Nittany Lions' field hockey program --- than anything else. That's a good overriding factor, and a nice reminder that money and prestige don't always drive decisions in non-revenue sports. Nonetheless, it is a trade of a final four team for an outfit that won two games last year. It'll be a few years --- at least --- before Tambroni has a team playing on Memorial Day weekend.

* Maryland

The Terrapins shouldn't be criticized for getting rebuffed by Tambroni, which is probably a tempting thing for second-guessers to do. Tillman's resume --- 20-19 over three seasons --- isn't particularly deep, but the short-term prognosis remains pretty much the same. If Maryland gets decent goalie play in 2011, it has a chance to play deep into May. The next year, with the starting attack and starting close defense wiped out by graduation, there will be a step back. That sequence was going to play out regardless of the coach. Tillman is bright and energetic, but this is still a bit of a gamble.

* Cornell

The Big Red lose a coach with a 109-40 record, which typically would be a pretty big deal. But elevating a capable assistant who was part of eight straight Ivy League title teams isn't a bad way to solve the problem. The Big Red will maintain continuity, and that's important for a group with so much success.

LOSERS

* Ivy League

Five of the Ivy's seven jobs have turned over in the last 13 months, with four coaches --- Bill Tierney (Princeton to Denver), Brian Voelker (Penn to Drexel), Tillman (Harvard to Maryland) and Tambroni (Cornell to Penn State) --- electing to leave. All of those happened for different reasons, but that's still remarkable flight from such a competitive league.

* CAA coaches other than Tambroni

Given the gaggle of competitive programs, it wouldn't have been the worst thing for the Towsons and Delawares of the world to have Penn State not taking things particularly seriously in lacrosse. Tambroni's hire ensures the Nits will be a force before long.

* Dave Cottle

He's the one guy who left a job unwillingly and didn't wind up with a new one. In any sort of coaching shuffle, that's usually going land someone on the wrong side of this sort of assessment.

Analysis: In long run, Tillman hire will tell more about Maryland than coaching ability

In some ways, John Tillman is a very lucky man today.

He has jumped from a school where lacrosse wasn't taken all that seriously for years (certainly not in comparison to Ivy League brethren Princeton and Cornell) to a place that has earned NCAA tournament invitations 33 times in 40 years.

He takes over a team that returns, depending on whether Will Yeatman petitions and receives a restored year of eligibility, eight or nine of 10 starters.

He parlays a 20-19 record over three years --- including a not-so-pleasant 1-10 record in one-goal games, which I'll admit I was surprised to discover --- into a seven-year contract with a program that safely lands somewhere in the Second Five in terms of overall upside of college lacrosse programs.

(That would be behind Syracuse, Virginia, Johns Hopkins, North Carolina and Duke, in the same neighborhood as Cornell and Princeton and ahead of Georgetown and Notre Dame).

And in some ways, Tillman isn't so fortunate.

He inherits an impatient fan base that wanted to win big yesterday.

His track record as a head coach is sparse enough that the second he absorbs a dubious defeat, there will be questions about his readiness for the gig.

His day-in, day-out facilities lag behind the rest of the ACC.

In the short term, he'll receive minimal credit for anything that happens next year short of a national championship, simply because he inherits a loaded team.

Stretching it out a bit, he'll need to rebuild both his attack and his defense in 2012 when graduation takes a severe toll on the Terps.

It isn't paradise, and it isn't a disaster, either. Assuming Tillman does his usual recruiting magic, Maryland's talent level won't be an issue in the years to come. It wasn't in recent years, either.

The more this hire gets analyzed, the easier it is to come to the conclusion the eventual outcome of Tillman's tenure will likely say more about Maryland than it will about the coach.

Sure, Tillman's a bit of a risk. Of the 60 Division I lacrosse coaches this past spring, 35 have coached in an NCAA tournament game. Tillman has not.

At the same time, he's bright, engaging and personable. He helped scheme Navy to the final four in 2004 and the quarterfinals a year later, and it is an indication of how quickly he generated interest (among fans and especially recruits) at Harvard that going 6-6 this season was a mild disappointment.

Toward the latter half of his 12-year stint in Annapolis, it seemed clear he would be a capable head coach one day. Maryland understandably agrees, having made the most of the candidate pool willing to listen to it.

(An aside: Virginia assistant Marc Van Arsdale, who also interviewed at Maryland, was another fine possibility. Despite struggling during a head coaching stint at Penn --- not exactly a lacrosse bastion for the last two decades --- he's done an amazing job with the Cavaliers' offense and quietly is often the smartest man in the room --- by far. That Maryland eventually zeroed in on Tillman and Van Arsdale suggests a job well done by its search committee in figuring out the most capable options for the job).

Of course, there's a question that lingers not far beneath the surface and will remain submerged for a while: What if Tillman winds up producing results much like Dick Edell and Dave Cottle did?

The pair combined for 27 seasons in College Park, nine final fours, three Memorial Day appearances and no national titles. The Terps reached 21 NCAA tournaments in that span, including 18 in the last 20 years.

Contrary to popular opinion, failing to win a national championship does not constitute failure. Edell went 171-76 (.692) in 18 years and was inducted into the sport's hall of fame. Cottle was 99-45 (.688) in nine years, and with 280 total victories to his name will probably get the chance to coach again if he pleases.

Assigning a five-point scale (0-national title, 1-finalist, 2-semifinalist, 3-quarterfinalist, 4-first round, 5-missed tournament) to Maryland's results in that span, here's a breakdown of the average results of their stins in nine-year increments --- Edell I (1984-92), Edell II (1993-2001) and Cottle (2002-10):

Edell I: 3.56
Edell II: 2.78
Cottle: 3.00

Maryland was a quarterfinal team on an annual basis under Cottle, and a little better in the second half of Edell's time in College Park.

Nearly three decades is a pretty decent sample size. And at some point, after players, coaches and administrators come and go, the onus has to eventually fall on something as faceless as the institution.

If Tillman is outrageously successful (read: snaps the 35-year championship drought and vaults Maryland past Virginia and Hopkins on the national pecking order on a consistent basis) or an abysmal failure (a descent mirroring North Carolina's tumble in the late 1990s would fulfill that definition), he'll get the credit or blame. No one's done either lately at Maryland, and he's the changing variable.

But if he plugs along, wins nearly 70 percent of his game and reaches a final four every three or four years, then it will really be time for those who shunned a serious examination of the program vis-a-vis the consistent title contenders in the last month to reconsider their perspective of Maryland lacrosse.

And there's plenty to think about.

It starts with a locker room just a step above the visitors' digs at Cameron Indoor Stadium. The lousy condition of the Byrd Stadium field --- not to mention flipping between an overbooked practice field and the football turf facility that doesn't have lacrosse lines --- exacerbates matters.

But other questions exist. They include coaches' compensation, especially for assistants (that data will be interesting to discover). Same goes for wiggle room with admissions standards; anyone who believes that issue is confined to football is mistaken, even if no coach or athletic administrator can do a much about it.

The funny thing is no matter how much Maryland (again, this is the school, not the athletic department) tries to make people believe it is an academic juggernaut, it still won't be perceived to be in the same conversation as the Ivies, Hopkins, Duke and Georgetown. It's the same thing when Maryland is compared to North Carolina and Virginia.

Feel free to argue the reality, though that's beside the point. Perception means more in recruiting, and Maryland doesn't quite possess the same cachet to the parents of the future lawyers, bankers and financial gurus of America as a Princeton or a Hopkins or a Duke does.

The point of this isn't to degrade Tillman, who has a chance to be a superb coach and is a choice difficult for anyone to object to thanks to his smarts and savvy.

But, if like his predecessors, he doesn't win the big one, it will more likely reflect the environment in which he toils rather than his own efforts and competence to get the job done.

Tillman noncommittal about Terps' lacrosse staff

New Maryland lacrosse coach John Tillman has a seven-year deal and a new gig.

Now he just needs a staff.

There are options among his old Harvard assistants, including Kevin Warne (who ran the Crimson's defense) and Rob Cross.

There are also options from Dave Cottle's last Maryland staff. Defensive coordinator Dave Slafkosky just completed his 27th season at Maryland, and Terp alum Ryan Moran coached with Tillman for two seasons at Navy. Moran spent the last three years at Maryland.

"That's something we have to sit down and discuss," Tillman said. "I have a lot of loyalty toward [my assistants], and I feel like there are some great assistants down at Maryland. This is one of the trickier things about a coaching change because you know what's at stake."