When Maryland signed Steve Goins this summer, it barely registered in recruiting circles or even in College Park.

Most looked at the 6-foot-10, 250-pound center from Chicago as a practice body and a project with little hope of making an impact with the Terps this season, and possibly ever. Until his senior year in high school, Goins was either injured or indifferent about playing basketball

At first glance, it didn't appear that Goins would be anything more than an end-of-the-bench body who looked like one of those "All Lobby" players the late Al McGuire would talk about, someone who looked good until he stepped on the court.

But Gary Williams has seen rapid improvement from Goins since the start of preseason practice a month ago.

"I think he's getting it," Williams said this week. "That will really help us. If he can go after Braxton [Dupree] every day, if he can go after Jerome Burney every day, those three guys should be able to push each other and should be able to make each other better players. That's when you get better, that's when your team gets better."

Not that Goins is ready to be more than just a practice player who gets on the court for a couple of minutes at a time.

"He is in development, as we say," said Williams, sounding more like a Hollywood screenwriter than a high-profile coach. "He's not where you want him to be at. I just look at where he's come from since the first day of practice and I'm impressed. The stuff he's done, just in conditioning, he's never done anything like that in his life. He never lifted a weight in his life. It's all new to him."

Williams also sounded like an amateur psychologist in talking about Goins.

"There's a good study out there somewhere about big guys," Williams said. "Remember when you were in seventh grade and the biggest guy in the class how everybody made fun of? I think there's a tendency to be a bully or you try to be this nice guy. I think Steve's really a nice guy. I don't want him that nice."

We all know where nice guys finish.