Amid speculation about his future, Kevin Willard said in a radio interview Tuesday that he planned to remain the Maryland men’s basketball coach “as of right now” and expressed hope that the school’s athletic department would commit to helping the program “be the best it can be.”

Appearing on Washington’s 106.7 The Fan ahead of the Terps’ Sweet 16 game Thursday against Florida, Willard told host Kevin Sheehan that he feels school officials better understand his “concerns” about the program’s funding. Maryland, along with other “power conference” schools stepping into the era of revenue sharing, will allocate the maximum allowable $20.5 million to its student-athletes starting this fall, but Willard on Tuesday indicated his unhappiness over his program’s share.

“Again, I don’t want monumental things,” said Willard, who has been linked to the opening at Villanova. “I just want this program to be the best it can be. I think I’m not asking for that much.”

Asked whether he would remain as coach, Willard laughed and said: “As of right now, I’m staying, Kev, yes.”

Asked whether he was comfortable saying he expected to receive the resources he needed to stay at Maryland, Willard said, “Yes, absolutely.” He pointed to his discussions with deputy athletic director and chief strategy officer Brian Ullmann, whom he has worked with since former athletic director Damon Evans left last week for the same position at Southern Methodist.

Ullmann has “been great,” said Willard, who did not mention interim athletic director Colleen Sorem in the interview. “He’s the first guy that’s actually sat down with me, talked to me and really found out what my concerns [are] and what I really wanted. Because it’s not a contractual thing for me. It’s more of a program thing for me. And Brian and I are on the same page. He has been awesome. He has put a lot of what I’ve felt over the last three years about the program — I think he’s finally starting to understand where I want this program to go.

“And that’s all that matters to me. What [former coach] Lefty [Driesell] did, what Gary [Williams] did, what Mark [Turgeon] did, what I want to try to do is elevate this program to the best. It’s what our fans want. It’s what my donors want. They talk about it all the time. It’s what I want. It’s what my expectations are, and when you’re at a place like Maryland, there’s just certain things that need to be done to be at the top of college basketball. And I can tell you that — I don’t know if Brian’s trying to get the AD job, but Brian has been phenomenal."

Willard, who is 65-38 in his three years in College Park, acknowledged that more funding for the program could come at the expense of the school’s other teams, including football and women’s basketball. "I don’t want to take away from those programs," he said.

But Willard, who had been in preliminary talks with Evans about a contract extension, said he wanted guarantees, not promises, about the school’s level of support for his program. Last week, ahead of Maryland’s first-round NCAA tournament game, Willard said the athletic department was unwilling to pay for an additional night in New York for his team after the Terps played Syracuse in the Gotham Classic in Brooklyn on Dec. 21.

“There’s schools out there that are going to be able to do things that we can’t do, so … I don’t want someone telling me that we’re going to do it," Willard said. “I want it put in my contract. I don’t want people making decisions about my program who aren’t involved in my program that make decisions that affect my staff’s life, my life but doesn’t affect their life. So those are big ones for me because I live it, breathe it every single day. And again, I want this place to be the best. As you know, this fan base expects that, but to be perfectly honest with you, it hasn’t been treated that way for a long time, and my goal is to get it there.”

Willard has not disclosed the budget for the Terps' current roster, but he called the sport’s transfer portal, which opened Tuesday, “crazy.” Some players, he said, are asking for $2 million to $3 million to sign with a team.

“The money has exploded crazy because we have no guardrails, we have no rules,” Willard said. “It’s been as badly implemented of a rule as ever in any sport, and kids, their agents, are taking advantage of it. Every player has an agent. Every agent is calling every school and saying, ‘Hey, I got $1.2 million here. Give me $1.4 [million] and we’re done.’ If you don’t have this profit share and the rev[enue], you’re not going to be able to compete. It’s just the way it is.”