Maryland basketball lost Jalen Smith to the NBA, but a pair of newcomers are ready to help
“I know how tough the Big Ten is at that big guy spot,” said Morsell, who has played alongside Bruno Fernando, now with the Atlanta Hawks, and Jalen Smith, who will probably be a first-round NBA draft pick Wednesday.
Morsell has started 81 games for the Terrapins and is familiar with the big men returning throughout the conference — players such as Iowa’s Luka Garza, Wisconsin’s Nate Reuvers and Illinois’ Kofi Cockburn. But for a time this spring, Maryland’s 2020-21 roster included only two eligible frontcourt players — sophomore Donta Scott, a 6-foot-7 forward who became a regular starter last season, and sophomore Chol Marial, a high-upside, 7-2 center who has been hampered by injuries the past few years.
“It was definitely important” to bring in additional players, Morsell said, “but Coach Turgeon did his thing, for sure.”
The Terps added Galin Smith, a 6-9 graduate transfer from Alabama, and Jairus Hamilton, a 6-8 forward from Boston College. They both have years of experience at the college level, and they will presumably combine with Marial and Scott to give Maryland two options at each of the frontcourt positions. Even though Scott is the only established returner, Turgeon said he has been “pleasantly surprised” with the group of players as his team prepares for a season that is scheduled to begin Nov. 25 against Old Dominion.
Maryland had depth issues at center last year following the midseason departure of twins Makhi and Makhel Mitchell, but those worries were largely masked by Jalen Smith’s standout season and his ability to stay out of foul trouble. As a sophomore, Smith played 31.3 minutes per game (second most on the team), averaging 15.5 points and 10.5 rebounds. He gained consistency, which he lacked as a freshman, and developed significantly as a three-point shooter. The Terps also lost forward Ricky Lindo Jr., who transferred to George Washington. Lindo played only 7.0 minutes per game, but his role could have expanded this season. Joshua Tomaic, another forward on last year’s roster, transferred to San Diego State during the offseason.
Galin Smith and Hamilton joined the team during the coronavirus pandemic, and official practices began about a month ago. Maryland’s roster features a handful of established players, such as Morsell and junior guards Aaron Wiggins and Eric Ayala, but they’re joined by an influx of newcomers. For Smith and Hamilton, the adjustment process at Maryland was less drastic than it was for the team’s freshmen, a group that includes Swiss forward Arnaud Revaz. Both Smith and Hamilton come from major-conference programs. Hamilton, a regular starter at Boston College, averaged 9.5 points and 4.3 rebounds in 2019-20, and Smith started seven of his 31 games for the Crimson Tide last season, averaging 3.1 points and 2.5 rebounds.
“Galin Smith and Jairus have been well coached, and they can pick things up,” Turgeon said. “They know what a college practice is like. They know what games are like. They’ve played in great leagues, so they’ve come along really quickly.”
Both players add physicality to the team, Morsell said. At a recent practice, Hamilton and Scott dived for a loose ball, and Turgeon said, “I was just praying they’d both get up.” Hamilton describes himself as a versatile player, and Hamilton reminds Morsell of former Terps forward Justin Jackson. Hamilton will mostly play power forward, and Jalen Smith’s role last season was part of what made Maryland seem like an attractive option.
“Seeing all the opportunities that they gave him, just free-flowing play and being able to showcase all the versatility that he had,” said Hamilton, a junior who recently received a waiver to be eligible this season. “He’s a great player, a lottery pick. That definitely intrigued me and got me interested in coming here.”
Galin Smith, who has only one season of eligibility remaining, was also impressed by how Maryland developed big men, including Jalen Smith and Fernando. When considering places where he could finish his college career, he said he was “looking for a home for my last year, somewhere I could feel like it’s a family and not [like] I was just being rented for that one year.”
He will split time at center with Marial, who played sparingly last season after he had surgery in September 2019 to repair stress fractures in both legs. Marial has essentially been injured for the past three years, Turgeon said, but now he is entirely pain-free in his left leg and is only occasionally bothered by his right leg. Because of the pandemic, players couldn’t work out on campus for a long stretch through the spring and summer, so Marial lost valuable time with the Terps’ director of basketball performance, Kyle Tarp.
“He was a little bit rusty when we started, just like every player was,” Turgeon said. “But Chol’s coming. … He’s starting to look like the Chol that I remember coming out of high school a few years ago. It’s exciting, and he’s got a great attitude. There are a lot of things that we didn’t know he could do, because he just wasn’t able to do it.”
A healthy Marial could develop into a valuable shot blocker and rim protector for the Terps. Marial showed flashes of that ability in his limited appearances last season, but he played more than five minutes on only four occasions.
This group of players can’t replace Jalen Smith’s presence, but together they form a patchwork collection of potential and experience. Their success depends on variables — the transfers’ ability within Maryland’s system, Marial’s health and the size of Scott’s sophomore-year leap — but Turgeon at least has options, players who are prepared to step in and fill what was once a worrisome void.
“We feel good about our frontcourt,” Turgeon said. “There’s no Bruno. There’s no ‘Stix.’ Those guys are special. But we have some guys that are really good players that are going to get better and better.”
