If you had the Maryland Terrapins sitting at 19-2 heading into the last game in January when you did your preseason picks then I’m taking you to Vegas by way of Atlantic City. Even the most optimistic fan could never have seen all of this coming. But it has. And – with absolutely no respect to Ken Pomeroy – there are substantive reasons for it and reasons to believe that the magic will continue into February and beyond.
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So, yeah, the Terps are 19-2 and sitting atop the Big Ten at 7-1 – just ahead of preseason favorite Wisconsin. The two teams have a couple of key things in common. Both are filled with skilled players and they are the two best defensive clubs in the conference. Beyond that they are nothing alike. The Badgers start four seniors who have played in a plethora of big games in their respective careers. They just seem to find ways to win and they have won in improbably fashion in a few of their league games – most recently against Rutgers in New York City this weekend. That game was every bit as much lost by Rutgers as it was won by Wisconsin. No disrespect intended.
On the other hand, the Terps start three insanely resourceful freshmen who seem to be buoyed by the presence of the All-American level presence of combo guard Melo Trimble and a host of veterans who have also played in a lot of high level games over the past two plus seasons. Perhaps because of the presence of the freshmen the team seems to play with the emotion of kids. That can cut both ways sometimes….but for this group it works. They thrive on the steady, positive hand of Head Coach Mark Turgeon – who seems to be having every bit as much fun as the team. Perhaps because he is having that kind of fun and seems to have so much trust in his team, the coach seems to call the right play and put in the right sub time after time after time.
Fun is great. But it doesn’t win you games. There are two fundamental reasons why this team is where it is.
First, from the one to the four positions they could be the most skilled team in the league. Trimble and the three freshmen – Kevin Huerter, Justin Jackson, and Anthony Cowan – offer really impressive skill sets. Cowan is the fastest guy in the league. Between that speed and the well-known penetration skills of Trimble, priority number one of EVERY opponent is to take away Maryland’s guard penetration. Their ability to attack defenses opens up opportunities for everybody else – whether it’s catch and shoot opportunities for their wealth of shooters or layups for the three headed center of Damonte Dodd, Michal Cekovsky and Ivan Bender. We live in a basketball world that was dreamed up by Mike Diantoni and Greg Popovich. The offensive game is played at the three point line and the rim. Metrics and common sense tell you that a contested fifteen footer is a complete waste of time and energy. To that end, this current group of Terps seems to have both an ideal composition for that type of offensive approach and, perhaps more importantly, the kind of team IQ to exploit almost any defense. Their offensive synchronicity not only passes the eyeball test, it passes the math test. The three starting guards – Cowan, Trimble and Huerter – combined for 17 assists against ZERO turnovers in Minneapolis and the team is hitting almost 44% of their threes in conference play. That’s eight games- large enough sample size.
Maybe the best part of all of that is that, given the youth, the ceiling for this team offensively may still be a month away. Huerter and Jackson, for instance, are just finding their way and learning when and how to aggressively pick their spots. After his breakout 28 point/ 10 rebound performance against Minnesota, I had the chance to catch up with Jackson. I jokingly told him that I wanted to be him when I grow up. He looked at me and laughed and said, “I had no idea I had 28….I’ve never shot like that”. Either ignorance is bliss or he was just being modest. Dude has been cash money all year long.
As sports fans we tend to fixate on scoring and offense. It wins you headlines and cheerleaders. It just usually doesn’t win trophies. What wins hardware is working your ass of defensively and being able to come up with big stops in big moments. While the Terps have lit up teams like Iowa and Minnesota in the second half of games, they’ve also been able to get the big stop or big steal when needed in possession games. They are getting very little respect for leading the conference in both field goal percentage defense and are second in three point percentage defense. For anybody who has ever coached a minute of basketball you have to watch the Terp rotations on defense. They’re textbook.
Those are stats normally reserved for Badgers.
The skill level on offense and the effort on defense manifest themselves in tangible stats. The other things that benefit this team are a little more intangible. Winning and chemistry are often times part of the “chicken or the egg” discussion of what comes first. Does winning breed chemistry or does chemistry breed winning. Regardless of where you stand, this group’s chemistry is undeniable. That chemistry is partially forged by a lack of respect that this team and this fan base perceive. Other fan bases decry the lack of signature wins and a favorable conference schedule. Evidently the pollsters and pundits feel the same way. I can promise you this group knows it is the lowest ranked 2-loss team the country.
If they keep all of this up the anonymity and the level of respect are about to change in a big way.
Terps Analyst
A fixture in the Washington sports scene since his days as a player and a coach, Chris Knoche has accumulated a diverse resume as a media presence in town for more than two decades. That resume has earned him opportunities on both national and local stages and made him a Washington DC staple on radio, television and in digital media.