Buzz Williams tried to warn everyone.

After Maryland men’s basketball’s first loss of the season, the coach said his team had a “litany of problems.” Ahead of the Marquette game, Williams said the Terps were “approaching kindergarten” when it came to playing with the level of energy he demands.

Losses have since piled up — back-to-back blowouts in Las Vegas against Gonzaga and Alabama, then an 83-64 defeat in the Terps’ Big Ten opener against Iowa. Now 10 games into his first season in College Park, it’s clear Williams’ warnings were for good reason.

“We don’t know who we are, and we’re trying to figure out who we are,” Williams said last Tuesday ahead of the Iowa game.

The litany of problems he referenced starts on offense. At the heart of the Terps’ issues is the lack of a reliable ballhandler, which has caused Maryland to turn the ball over at a Big Ten-high of 13.9 times a game.

Junior guard Myles Rice, expected to be the Terps’ lead guard, has recorded the same number of turnovers as assists. Freshman guards Darius Adams, Andre Mills and Guillermo Del Pino have turned it over more than they’ve assisted.

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5-foot-11 guard Diggy Coit has been Maryland’s best backcourt option, averaging 13 points a game, but he had no assists and three turnovers on Saturday.

With limited offensive options, the game plan has centered around feeding senior forward Pharrel Payne the ball in the post. It’s created an element of predictability for opposing defenses.

Williams said last Tuesday that Maryland is trying to “have the right dose of where we get [Payne] touches.” They varied the setup of his looks on Saturday, but it often led to a similar result.

Eight of Maryland’s 18 turnovers involved an action intended to get Payne the ball, an indication Iowa knew exactly what was coming.

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“We need him to have a very high usage rate,” Williams said. “The usage rate may not mean he has to score, but when he gets the touch, what are we doing on the weak side of [the floor]? And then when he gets the touch in the middle of the floor, what are we doing relative to the spacing on the outside thirds?”

Eleven of the Terps’ giveaways were “live-ball” turnovers, where Iowa gained possession and immediately pushed the ball down the court. The Hawkeyes turned those mistakes into 21 points despite being one of the slowest offenses in the country.

“When it’s a live-ball turnover, now your defense is broken and it’s never set, and you’re playing from behind the entire possession,” Williams said. “All of those things have compounded in a negative way.”

The Terps are also shooting a conference-worst 30.9 percent on 3-pointers. Coit is the lone player who has made more than 15 threes, while the rest of the rotation outside of Del Pino shoots 33 percent or worse.

Poor spacing allows defenses to collapse on Payne, abandon corner shooters and swipe at ball handlers as they drive to the rim. The clip below is a prime example. Notice how all five Hawkeyes turn to Payne — with four players in the paint — as soon as he touches the ball.

It’s unlikely Williams will fundamentally change Maryland’s offense a third of the way into the season. He probably shouldn’t, either, considering the limited talent around Payne.

But he’ll have to better use his star and the players around him. If not, the Terps’ Big Ten season could end in an ugly record.