COLLEGE BASKETBALL / NCAA POSTSEASON TOURNAMENTS : The Top Terrapin : Williams Guides Maryland Out of the Bad Times

After five seasons, 146 games, maybe 700 practices, 1,000 recruiting phone calls and who knows how many miles traveled, Maryland basketball Coach Gary Williams did the strangest thing a few days ago.

He smiled.

Not a smirk. Not a grin. A smile. An actual, see-I-do-have-teeth smile.

Maryland assistant Art Perry was there at the Sunday staff meeting and saw the whole thing with his own two eyes.

“He was as relaxed as I’ve ever seen him in the last four years,” said Perry, who came to Maryland a year after Williams was hired to rescue the Terrapin program. “People who don’t know Gary won’t appreciate that comment. But people who do will understand.”

The people who do--his assistants, his players, his family, his friends--have watched as Williams painstakingly rebuilt not only a basketball program, but also an image gutted by the drug-overdose death of Len Bias and later, NCAA sanctions. And few times, if ever, did Williams look as if he enjoyed one moment of it.

Until now. Sort of.

Now, as an afternoon rain taps away at the Cole Field House roof, Williams stands near courtside and tries to put the long journey into perspective. From suicide mission to Sweet 16, that’s what Williams has done here. His team, nothing more than afterthought, seeded No. 10 when the NCAA tournament began, now prepares to face third-seeded Michigan in Friday’s Midwest Regional semifinal.

Someone asks if the events of the last two weeks--Maryland’s first tournament appearance since 1988, a first-round victory over St. Louis, a second-round triumph over Final Four candidate Massachusetts, Terp hysteria on campus and off--diminishes the memory of the dark days, when Williams wondered on more than one occasion if he had made a career mistake.

“No,” says Williams, almost in a monotone. “This is this year. Those other years, that’s something that will never be made up. That was four years out of the five of my (Maryland) coaching career that will never be made up.

“But I’m happy now.”

Thirty years ago, Williams played in this building. He came to Maryland in 1964 as a 6-foot, 170-pound guard from Collingswood, N.J. He left as the team co- captain, described as such in the 1966-67 Terrapin media guide: “ . . . a fierce competitor with a heart as big as his chest.”

Nothing has changed. Williams still considers himself the point man for a basketball program that desperately needed one.

When Bias died in the spring of 1986, and Coach Lefty Driesell was forced out shortly thereafter, and clumsy Bob Wade came in and completed the damage by violating NCAA rules during his three-year reign, there was no worse place to be than Maryland. It had been touched by tragedy and later crippled by NCAA probation that, among other things, kept the Terrapins from postseason play until this season.

Williams was there for some of the worst of it, when the NCAA delivered its harsher-than-expected sentence and left the Maryland program in little pieces. Williams, who had left a sweetheart situation at Ohio State, was supposed to glue it all together again.

“You had doubts,” Williams says. “But you gradually get it resolved, that you just got to make this happen. That’s what it eventually came to, that we were just going to make it happen. I didn’t know how it was going to happen. I didn’t know it would be probably this quick, but I felt that we could be good here.”

It wasn’t easy. During the first few years, Williams and his assistants couldn’t get a top-rated recruit anywhere near the place. After all, who wanted to go where the summer Olympics were on television more often than Maryland. And don’t think opposing Atlantic Coast Conference recruiters didn’t mention it, either.

Williams didn’t have a freshman starter in 1990. Or 1991. Or 1992. Donyell Marshall, now merely the second- or third-best player in the country, thought about signing with the Terrapins a few years ago. But with no chance of playing in the tournament until 1994, why bother?

Maryland’s victory totals began to slide, from the pre-probation 19 to 16, to 14 and then 12. But despite the losses, Williams and Perry began to get players. Guard Johnny Rhodes, who was on every recruiter’s list, and forward Exree Hipp, who wasn’t, decided to take a chance on the Terps and were rewarded with starting positions as freshmen last year. The same thing happened this season, when forward Keith Booth and center Joe Smith signed on.

Now look at them: Hipp, Rhodes, Booth and Smith all average in double figures. Another sophomore, starting guard Duane Simpkins is also in double digits. And among the first three substitutes, two are freshmen--swingman Nick Bosnic and guard Matt Kovarik--and one is a sophomore, forward Mario Lucas.

As it turns out, the star of the team is the guy with the plain name--Joe Smith. Rhodes, who needs a little help with his cliches, has called him, “our bread and water guy.” Perry, who said Smith is the best player he has ever recruited, swears every ACC school was after the 6-10 newcomer from Norfolk, Va.

That isn’t exactly true. According to Smith, who would know, North Carolina, Duke, Clemson and Georgia Tech weren’t the least bit interested. And although Maryland was crazy about Smith, nobody could quite understand why Smith would be crazy about Maryland.

“A lot of my friends, when they found out I was coming here, they were like, ‘Why you wanna go there? They just got off probation and they’re not gonna be back for a couple of years,’ ” said Smith, who averages 19.7 points, 10.6 rebounds (25.5 points, 10.0 rebounds in the two tournament games) and was recently named the national freshman of the year by the U.S. Basketball Writers Assn. “But now that we’re in the Sweet 16, they have had a change of mind.”

Truth is, Smith wasn’t so sure himself about this Maryland team. He thought they’d win enough games to make the tournament, but almost nobody--Perry, Williams, Rhodes, etc.--figured the Terrapins would still be playing March 25.

Except one player . . . Hipp. Back in November, before anyone knew how good Maryland would be, Hipp offered Baltimore Sun reporter Don Markus a prediction. Hipp said the Terrapins would win 16 or 17 games, finish in the middle of the ACC standings, earn an NCAA tournament invitation and advance to the Sweet 16.

“You mean the NIT,” said Markus.

“No,” said Hipp, “the NCAAs.”

“I think you’re crazy,” said Markus.

Maryland’ record: 18-11. Maryland’s ACC finish: tied for fourth. Maryland’s tournament record: 2-0 . . . and counting.

With 20 seconds to go in last Saturday’s game against second-seeded Massachusetts, Hipp scanned press row in search of Markus. When he found him, Hipp smiled and mouthed three short words.

“Told you so.”