The University of Maryland Terrapins travel South this weekend, to face the Demon Deacons of Wake Forest in Winston Salem.
MD enters the game 2-3 overall, and 1-0 in the ACC. Wake is 3-2 overall, 1-1 in the ACC.
The Terps are the only team in the ACC Atlantic, that does not have a conference loss. MD is also the only team in the ACC Atlantic, that has only played 1 Conference game. A win on the road against a division-foe, could go a long way to starting to mitigate some of the ill-feelings that arose during the auspicious start of this 2009 season.
The Demon Deacons lost their first-game of the season 24-21 at home to Baylor, who has started the year 3-1. In Week 2, Wake Forest beat Stanford 24-17, also at home. Stanford is 4-1 overall, and currently leads the Pac-10 with a 3-0 record.
In Weeks 3, and 4, Wake beat up on Elon, and lost their first-road game in a 27-24 game at Boston College.
This past weekend, WF won against NCST at home.
On Offense, Wake is averaging 408 yards per game, with 271.8 yards passing, and 136.2 yards rushing.
On Defense, Wake is giving-up 359.4 yards per game, including 228.6 through the air.
Maryland’s Defensive Coordinator Don Brown has to be licking his chops thinking of attacking Wake Quarterback Riley Skinner. The Senior QB was sacked 6 times this past-weekend against NCST, and coughed the ball-up 3 times. Still, Skinner was able to set a career-high in passing-yards for the third consecutive week.
Last-year, the Terps beat #21 Wake 26-0 at-home. In that game, Chris Turner threw for 321 yards, and a TD. MD generated 470 yards of offense overall, and averaged 4.2 yards on their 33 rushing-attempts.
Wake was held to 219 total yards, with Riley only able to muster 146 passing-yards. Wake had trouble with the pass-rush in that game as well, as Riley was sacked 4 times.
Da’Rel Scott who had 73 yards in that game, will not be available for this one. Thought to be definitively out for the season after his injury against Clemson, there is now some hope he could rejoin the Terps prior to the end of the year.
As disappointing as it is to lose a defending 1st-team All-Conference player like Scott, the reality is MD has backups such as Meggett, Gary Douglas, Morgan Green, and the true-freshman Caleb Porzel, and DJ Adams that have the ability to step-up.
There is no such depth existing on the offensive-line, to truly replace Bruce Campbell. Campbell suffered an MCL injury Saturday, and might be out for this week.
My interest for this week is seeing if MD can establish their rushing-game, and if the defense can build-off of this past-week. You want to see the Terps get Riley to the turf.
Wake’s Jim Grobe is an outstanding Head-Coach, who gets maximum production out of the talent he has. He also always seems to have terrific special-teams. He will have the Deacons ready to avenge last-year, and defend their home-field.
The Terps should probably not be expected to win this road-game, but this is a winnable weak for MD. This is a weekend where I am confident MD has the better overall talent. Of course the previous two-times that has happened this year, the Terps needed OT to secure 1 win, and lost the other.
This is a swing-game for MD. If you win, you are 3-3, 2-0 in conference, and the division, with games against UVA, and Duke the following-weeks.
For MD to take advantage of this opportunity, they will need their Senior QB to use his experience, and show an ability to win on the road.
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Chris Stoner founded Baltimore Sports and Life in 2009. He has appeared as a radio guest with 1090 WBAL, 105.7 The Fan, CBS 1300, Q1370, WOYK 1350, WKAV 1400, and WNST 1570. He has also been interviewed by The Baltimore Sun, Baltimore Business Journal, and PressBox (TV). As Owner, his responsibilities include serving as the Managing Editor, Publicist, & Sales Director.