SEATTLE — The best coaches teach their teams to dictate the terms. Don’t play down to the opponent. Don’t adapt to how the opponent wants to play.

Force the opponent to adapt to you.

Only time will tell if that lesson has sunk in for the fourth-seeded Terrapins men’s basketball team, which will take on Grand Canyon University on Friday afternoon in the NCAA tournament. But coach Kevin Willard definitely practices what he preaches.

At the negotiating table for his next contract, he has the University of Maryland jammed against the baseline, huffing and puffing with its hands on its hips for a breath.

In a scathingly (and refreshingly) honest press conference a day ahead of his team’s tournament debut, Willard laid out the precarious state of Terps basketball.

The athletic director is presumed to be taking a new job in a lesser conference. Willard has had a contract extension presented to him, but he hasn’t signed it. After a bounce-back season — featuring a nationally ranked squad led by a potential NBA lottery pick prepping for a deep postseason run — the Terps could plummet right back into the cellar because their war chest for name, image and likeness and revenue sharing isn’t where Willard thinks it should be.

I wrote Monday that I didn’t think Willard had done enough to earn a reported contract extension that would make him one of the 10 highest-paid coaches in the country. But Willard did something masterful Thursday — he flipped the conversation to ask if Maryland deserves him.

“I need to make fundamental changes to the program,” he said. “That’s what I’m focused on right now. That’s why a deal hasn’t got done. I need to see fundamental changes done. I want this program to be great. I want to be the best in the country. I want to win a national championship. But there’s things that need to change.”

There have been reports tying Willard to Villanova, a school that doesn’t have high-level football (competing for department dollars) and has won recent national titles. That job would put Willard a smidge closer to his native New York, too.

Would he leave for Villanova? I’m not sure, and I feel a little skeptical on a few points. But the more pressing question now is if Maryland can afford to let Willard leave. If it does, it will be skewered for not caring enough about being a perennial hoops contender.

Some of Willard’s biggest claims probably deserve further scrutiny, such as saying the Terps have “one of the worst, if not [the] lowest” NIL budget of the past two years. It’s worth noting that as revenue sharing with athletes begins, NIL budgets — currently the main compensation and enticement for players — may not play as big a factor in recruiting and retention.

But one specific gripe stood out. Willard noted that he wanted to extend a trip to New York after the Terps played (and thrashed) Syracuse in Brooklyn, hoping to celebrate the holidays in the city with his team.

“I was told we can’t do that because it’s too expensive,” he said. “So I don’t know how we can be a top-tier program if we can’t spend one extra night in New York because it’s too expensive.”

Would Duke do it? Would Kentucky? Without being able to scrutinize the hotel bill, it seems like a feasible expense for a program that values basketball.

Willard is openly asking if Maryland is that kind of school.

The brilliant part about Willard’s leverage play is that there’s not really anyone atop the athletic department to push back. Rumors that athletic director Damon Evans is “a leading candidate” to go to Southern Methodist University cropped up before Willard spoke to the press — and he went ahead and confirmed them. He’s used the power vacuum to make his demands for a bigger budget public (in addition to the pay raise he’s already been offered).

Again, I would prefer to see Willard make the bulk of his case in March by winning games. He has a charismatic and likable team that has the fans’ attention like few other groups in years, and Willard has to start turning around his tournament track record no matter where he’s coaching next year. Willard said he addressed the team directly about his job situation, which probably helps the working relationship with his players, but the distraction of the coaching and AD job market won’t help the Terps win Friday.

But, with the AD seemingly out and the coach discontent, Maryland — which has long prided itself as a basketball school (and has a women’s program more consistent with that standard) — has a lot more to lose than Willard does.

If Willard walks, the university will be battling the perception he’s created that it is too cheap to compete at the highest level. It’s going to be hard to hire a top-of-the-line coaching candidate without resources to match those ambitions.

It’s probably best for all parties if the Terps convince Willard to sign that offer sheet Evans dropped off Sunday. According to Willard, it’s his preferred outcome.

“I’m confident that we’ll get things done. It’s a little difficult right now,” he said. “I’m not gonna lie, but I’m confident no matter who we’re negotiating with at the end of the day, this program’s gonna be in a great spot.”

Willard may not know whom he will be negotiating with next. But, with the bind he’s put his university in, and the power he has over the institution at this moment of uncertainty, it doesn’t really matter who is sitting across the table.

It’s Willard’s game now. Fighting for the basketball program’s future, it’s all Maryland can do just to keep pace.