The WVU/UMD bball series was killed by Gary Williams.When Williams was at Ohio St they played a few games against West Virginia when we were still in the A10 and the Buckeyes had a lot of trouble. I remember them just getting killed in Morgantown. When Williams went back to College Park, he quickly the series. Would love to see it come back. WVU and UMD should play each other in everything IMO

Jackson


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WVU, Terps may resume rivalry

West Virginia has asked Maryland to consider resuming their basketball rivalry, which lapsed 15 years ago.

There was a game on Dec. 7, 2003 in Washington which the Mountaineers won 78-77 in overtime, but that wasn’t really planned. The matchup came in the losers’ bracket of the four-team BB&T Classic.

Maryland happens to be WVU assistant Billy Hahn’s alma mater and he served as an assistant coach there for 12 years. So head coach Bob Huggins had him contact Gary Williams, the Terrapins’ veteran head coach, about playing on a regular basis.

“We talked about home-and-home (once annually) and it’s now on Gary’s plate,” Hahn said. “He’s got to make the decision. But he did say he couldn’t do it for next season because his schedule already is set for 2008-09.

“I said, ‘Well, you just let us know when you want to play.’”

West Virginia won five of the last six meetings and leads the all-time series by 23-14 which started in 1925-26. Williams is 1-5 against WVU.

Except for a nine-game Mountaineer winning streak from 1933-34 to 1952-53, it has been a highly competitive series. During a seven-year stretch from 1964-70, the schools met in basketball twice each year.

Hahn never played against West Virginia but had a hand in coaching against the Mountaineers while at both Ohio University and Maryland. Now he hopes to coach against his alma mater while at WVU.

He thinks Williams decided to quit scheduling West Virginia after what he called two “nasty” contests between the two schools, one in Morgantown and the other at College Park, Md.

“No major fights broke out,” Hahn said. “It was rough stuff that something could have happened. One game was here and the other over there. And after that, we never played again.”

However, both Huggins and Hahn believe it would make good sense for Maryland and West Virginia to play.

“We’re close. The states border each other,” Hahn said. “Both program shave had very good success. Both tgeams have a very good fan base. So why not play home and home?

“It’s a good game. I’ve been on both sides of West Virginia-Maryland. We hope the two schools can get together again.”

Ironically, Maryland has dropped West Virginia in football from its 2008 and 2009 seasons to play a California school.