Terps fall to #1 Duke; The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

The University of Maryland had an opportunity to give Coach Gary Williams’ his 8th victory over a #1 ranked team, but the defending National Champion Duke Blue Devils made the plays necessary down the stretch to pull away for the 71-64 victory.

Despite a horrific stretch of shooting to start the game, MD found themselves down just 1 at half. Mainly MD was able to stay in the game because they scraped and played hard on the defensive end of the court.

Some Coaches say you can find out about yourself in close losses. Coach Williams often says he thinks teams find out more about themselves in meaningful wins. Through 15 games of this 2010-11 season I think what we have found out about MD is that they can compete with any team on any court, but they have not yet shown they can do enough to beat a quality team.

I feel like this could be a pretty dangerous MD team if and when they get that break-through.

The Good:

1) While MD had all sorts of early offensive struggles, the defense came out active. Through the first 10 minutes of the game, the Terps were getting out on the shooters, jumping the passing lanes, and blocking their share of shots.

2) After entering the game as a reserve, Tucker made an immediate difference. The ball moved better with him on the floor, and he also helped on the glass. He finished with 14 points, 7 rebounds,  2 assists and 2 blocks.

3) Pe’Shon Howard finished with 5 points and 3 assists. He made some mistakes we will point out below, but the offense improved when he first came off the bench.

4) Hawk Palsson again made a difference with his hustling and defensive intensity. Took a nice charge on Smith in the 2nd half, added 3 boards (2 offensive).

5) Beautiful start to the 2nd half for MD with their 7-0 run. Duke had scored to end the 1st half and claim the lead, it was imperative for the Terps to get off to a good start in the final 20 minutes and maintain their confidence.

6) Gregory filled-up the stat sheet with 8 points, 4 rebounds, 4 blocks, and 3 steals. He more than held his own against the Duke front-line.

7) Williams did a good job baiting Mason Plumlee into his 5th foul.

8) MD won on the boards 40-37, and improved on the glass as the game progressed.

9) The Terps had 16 turnovers (as did Duke). 16 turnovers in Cameron with MD’s younger guards controlling the ball is a plus.

10) MD had 17 assists on their 26 Field Goals made, and also had 8 blocks.

11) Duke shot 6 of 21 from 3 point land (28.6%). Some of that may have been an off shooting night for the Devils, part of that is MD playing good perimeter defense.

12) The Blue Devils best athlete and most talented player is Irving and obviously he was again unavailable tonight. For the players that were on the floor, MD had just as much athletic talent as Duke.

13) Mosley played hard tonight, and provided a good defensive effort. Seems clear he is not going to reach the offensive heights we had hoped for him, but as long as he aggressively attacks and cuts around the rim he can contribute. Mosley finished with 8 points, 6 boards, 2 assists, 2 steals.

14) Williams finished with 23 points, 13 boards, and 2 blocks. Pretty strong night for the Sophomore, even more impressive because he had some uncharacteristic errors and misses.

The Bad:

1) Williams picked-up his 2nd foul of the game at the 12:43 mark. Both fouls were avoidable. The first foul was on a simple arm-bar, and the second was stepping-up to take a charge. Him being on the floor means more than potentially allowing an easy two.

2) Some of the early shots from MD were clearly bothered by the Duke. Bowie, Mosley, and Gregory all had wild misses we have not seen from them this season.

3) During Duke’s 11-0 run in the 2nd half, and for the half in-general, there were not enough touches for Williams. Some of the credit goes to Duke for preventing looks to Williams, but the Terps also get some of the blame for not being able to gain entry to the Sophomore Center.

4) Padgett provided a few minutes when Williams picked-up his 2nd foul but did not spend much time on the floor tonight. I would have liked to have seen a few more minutes for both him, and also Weijs.

5) Howard and a few others were guilty of trying to force passes that were not there in the 2nd half. The one play I’m thinking about with Howard came with him having some mustard on the ball. Bowie’s turnover came with a weak pass to Tucker.

The Ugly:

1) Maryland again left points at the line. While the Terps came into this game shooting just 65% from the charity-stripe, a large portion of the negative percentage was due to the large amount of misses from Williams. Tonight though there were a number of Terrapins that contributed. MD finished 9 for 17 at the foul-line with 3 misses from Williams, and Gregory also missing 2.

2) 15 games into his Collegiate career, Stoglin has already had a number of big moments. Tonight was a learning experience for the Freshman. The atmosphere clearly got to him, as he missed all 6 of his three point attempts and also had 3 turnovers. It is a lot to ask of any player (let alone a young Freshman) to be able to go into Duke and perform, but for MD to have pulled the upset tonight they needed Stoglin to provide some scoring.

3) If I can point-out Stoglin, I have to point out the Senior Adrian Bowie. Bowie had played well since moving off the ball, but he provided just 1 point tonight. He had 4 rebounds, and 5 assists (against just 1 turnover) but 1 point on 4 shots is not enough from him. You would have liked to have seen the Senior be more aggressive in his last outing at Duke.

Up-Next:

The now 10-5 (0-2 in the ACC) Maryland Terrapins play at Wake Forest on Wednesday. The Demon Deacons are 7-9 overall, and 0-1 in the ACC. Among the losses for Wake are Stetson, VCU, Winthrop, UNC Wilmington, Presbyterian, and Richmond.

It is absolutely imperative that MD gets this road victory.

After that, the Terps will play in Philadelphia Saturday against #7 Villanova. I talked about the Terps needing to break through against a quality opponent, the Wildcats will absolutely provide MD with that opportunity. That game will also be the Terps last chance to gain a meaningful out of conference win.