Maryland football Coach DJ Durkin considered Rick Court to be his most important lieutenant in College Park, often trumpeting Court as his first hire when he came to the school in December 2015. Durkin was on the tarmac, a head coach for the first time and about to catch a flight, when he made that call to ask Court if he would not only be his strength and conditioning coach but his right-hand man in building a new culture at a perennially mediocre program.
Court now is the first to leave the program because of the questions surrounding that culture, which has been labeled as toxic and abusive and potentially contributed to the death of 19-year-old Jordan McNair after the freshman player suffered heatstroke during a workout May 29.