Which college football coach candidates could replace Mike Locksley at Maryland? New York Times (Online) Bruce Feldman Mike Locksley became the first head coach fired this season Wednesday after Maryland decided it was time for a change . Locksley had a solid run earlier in his tenure with the Terps and did good work around the program, but things had backslid over the past three years. The move comes on the heels of Maryland's home loss to previously 1-4 Rutgers, squandering a double-digit halftime lead. They are 2-5 and 0-4 in the Big Ten. They dropped to 2-20 over the past three years in conference play. Locksley recruited some impressive young talent, but his program hasn't taken a big step forward this year. QB Malik Washington had three shaky games in a row in losses to UCLA, Nebraska and Ohio State, throwing one TD and six INTs. It'll be a challenge for the next head coach to retain some of those former blue-chip recruits. The Maryland job isn't great. This program hasn't won 10 games in a season in almost a quarter century, dating back to the Ralph Friedgen days. They've been an odd fit in the Big Ten since moving in 2014. They've never had a winning record in Big Ten play and haven't had one in conference play since 2010 in the ACC when Friedgen led them to their last Top 25 season, ranking No. 23. The top three names already being discussed in the Terps search are all sitting head coaches: New Mexico's Jason Eck, Wake Forest's Jake Dickert and Memphis' Charles Huff. Each has done exceptional work as a head coach, but would any of them jump at this job? Keep in mind it is not expected to be a big year on the coaching carousel. The 49-year-old Eck, a Big Ten offensive lineman at Wisconsin, has proven to be a grand-slam hire at his first stop at Idaho and now at New Mexico. He's 40-18 as a head coach at two programs that were reeling when he arrived. Last year, in his debut season, he took a team picked to finish 11th out of 12 in the Mountain West in the preseason and made them bowl-eligible for the first time since 2016, with just 34 returning players — the fewest of any FBS roster. His teams play a physical but fun style of offense and have punched above their weight. At Idaho, his team gave Oregon, a 49.5-point favorite, all it could handle three years ago. Last year, his Lobos were 15.5-point underdogs but still slaughtered UCLA, 35-10. Their lone defeat this year came at Oklahoma, where they lost 14-6 as a 21.5-point underdog. Eck was expected to be a frontrunner for the Wisconsin job if Luke Fickell couldn't turn things around, but now it looks like the Badgers won't be in the market. Is this the kind of job Eck would want to make a big move for? We'll see. Dickert, a Wisconsin native, is a proven winner. He brought desperately needed stability to Washington State when he was promoted to take over after Nick Rolovich was forced out and went 23-20 at a place that had been gutted. Then, he took over at Wake Forest last year and went 9-4 out of the gate at a program that had won only eight games in the previous two seasons combined. Now, he has Wake 6-1, ranked No. 17 in the country with their lone loss against No. 1 Miami. We know that ADs at a bunch of huge programs now have Dickert on their radar. We'd be a little surprised if he left for this job. Huff grew up in Maryland and played college ball at Hampton in Virginia, less than a four-hour drive away. He was a top assistant in the Big Ten at Penn State and has strong recruiting ties in the area. He's done very well at each of his three coaching stops. First, at Marshall, where he went 10-3 by his fourth season and was 32-20 overall. Last year at Southern Miss, he led the Golden Eagles to 7-5 and a bowl game after taking over a 1-11 team. In his first season at Memphis, the Tigers are 5-2 and a strong contender for the American title. He would make a lot of sense at Maryland, but would he make this job now? If he gets the job, that'd mean he would be coaching his fourth program in four years, a record for a Division I college head coach. Another head coach we've heard might get some consideration is first-year Oregon State head man JaMarcus Shephard. The 43-year-old is off to a phenomenal start in Corvallis, generating buzz for a program that had been left for dead. The Beavers are 5-2, with both defeats coming in competitive games against Top 25 programs with much bigger budgets, Texas Tech and Houston. Shephard's ability to find under-the-radar talent and put it in a system to flourish has been impressive. His breakout star, freshman WR Jesse Legree, actually went to high school at Maryland powerhouse St. Frances Academy in Baltimore. Shephard, a Kalen DeBoer protégé, is an Indiana native who coached in the Big Ten after five seasons at Purdue. Two other names to keep an eye on, we're told, are Indiana's coordinators Mike Shanahan , the OC, and Bryant Haines , the DC. The 36-year-old Shanahan, a former Pitt wideout, helped turn Fernando Mendoza into a Heisman Trophy winner last year. The 41-year-old Haines, an Ohio native, won the Broyles Award, which honors the nation's top assistant coach. Each knows the Big Ten well and is well-versed in Curt Cignetti's system, having coached with him since their days at Division II Indiana University of Pennsylvania, where Cignetti first started as head coach. Multiple industry sources told us this week that top candidates might be thinking twice about whether to wait for something better a year from now. One wildcard option is former Saint Francis head coach Biff Poggi , a Baltimore native with strong recruiting ties to the area and big connections in the region. Poggi was Jim Harbaugh's right-hand man when the former Michigan QB got that program headed in the right direction. He left to become head coach at Charlotte, where he went 6-16 in a year and a half in a situation that was a huge uphill climb. Tim Albin took the job after winning 30 games in three years in the MAC and is 2-17 there. Poggi served as Michigan's interim head coach last year after Sherrone Moore was fired and led them to a 2-1 record.