Turtledroppings.com – Maryland Football And Basketball Blog

In a week where there was nothing but negativity surrounding the basketball program (including our website), Saturday night was a bright spot.  No, I am not talking about the Terps busting out the gold uni’s.  I am talking about the must win game, where the Terps fought hard for all forty minutes, and held on to beat the Huricanes.  If you recall my breakdown against our ACC competition, Miami is one of the teams that has been giving Maryland fits.  For this night the Terps made sure everyone would be on a positive note heading into Tuesdays match up with UNC.

There were so many positive things bouncing through my head immediately after the game that I decided to wait until this morning to write about the game.  I didn’t want to sound like I was rambling on (but I am sure I still will) about how great the game was.  I am going to start with the defense.  Maryland was ready from the start.   They had a 10 second call early in the game, and that had everyone fired up, including Gary.  The press worked and they forced Miami into numerous turnovers.  At one point Maryland had 12 points off 13 Miami turnovers.  Miami has a decided advantage on the inside, and when Maryland went 3-2 zone and even a box and one against McClinton, they made sure the inside guys were not going to beat the Terps smaller front line.  In the first half Maryland was getting a ton of offensive rebounds, and that changed in the second half when they went to the zone and Miami was missing the three’s.  Overall, when you have the smaller front court, and you force your opponent into shooting 31 3-point attempts, you have done a good job on defense. 

Another bright spot was the dunking.  I can remember at least three dunks in this game.  Each and everyone got the team and the crowd fired up.  The biggest dunk of the night though, goes to freshly reinstated Jin Soo Kim.  His explosive dunk on a nice pass from Greivis Vasquez as the shot clock was running down, absolutely electrified the crowd.  He also hit a huge 3-pointer as the shot clock was running down.  One of our authors wrote about how he hoped he would come back and help us a win a game for the Terps.  On this night he had five points, in a game that was decided by five points (73-68).  Coincidence?  I would say that is helping your team win.

I will also give Gary a ton of credit here.  And this is where he always will get credit from me.  The game plan again worked to perfection.  Force Miami’s shaky ball handling into turnovers.  Check.  Don’t let McClinton beat you.  Check, the box and one was a brilliant call.  I honestly don’t remember seeing the Terps bust that out for a long time.  Gary knows this team is not conventional, and is trying to use any way possible to win.   The man was fired up on the sideline.  One thing you can not question is his fire and desire to win on game day.  He wears his emotion on his sleeve (and through his jacket) and has always appeared to get more out of his players, than maybe they are capable of giving.  The other big change of the night, was starting Sean Mosley over Eric Hayes.   Gary realized Hayes has been struggling, and Mosley has been coming on lately, and for the night anyway, it worked out well.

Now we will get to the other hot button issue of the team.  Greivis Vasquez.  He was  one Adrian Bowie missed lay-up (he was fouled, but easily could have finished it) away from being only the SECOND PLAYER in Maryland history to record a triple double.  On the night Vasquez’s line would be: 11 points, 10 boards, 9 assists, 1 steal, and ZERO TURNOVERS.  Sure he only shot 4-15, but he did it all.  Two moments stand out for me from Vasquez.  At one point he was on the bench when Hayes hit a three, and he was jumping around on the sideline like he was a middle school girl and the Jonas Brothers just walked into Comcast Center.  He wants nothing more than for this team to win, sometimes he just tries to do to much of it himself.  The second thing to really stand out was he hit a huge jumper at the 11:25 mark right after Miami had cut a 10 point lead to 7.  A missed shot there, and I think everyone associated with Maryland Basketball may have let those nasty thoughts about blowing leads to start and pop back into their heads.  It was an answer to a basket, if ever there was an answer needed. 

Landon Milbourne continued his improved play.  He finished with 17 points and 6 boards (3 offensive).  He is truly starting to understand his role on this team and has been running with it in ACC play.  Last night, he pulled his man out of the lane and dropped several of those 12-15 foot jumpers.  He was almost automatic.  His jumper is smooth, and if he continues to knock them down, his defender is going to have to respect that a little more, and he may be able to use his speed and blow by the guy.  He has been a pleasure to watch this season.

I think we need to give Eric Hayes his due also.  I don’t know the kid personally, but you have to think it has to be a little shot to the ego to lose your starting job.  He didn’t seem to sulk, and played very well in his 22 minutes.  One thing Gary did was get him into the game pretty quick.  I think it was only about 4 minutes into the game before he checked in.  Hayes finished with 8 points, and hit two threes.  If Mosley is going to continue playing like he has, Hayes off the bench is not going to hurt one bit.  He can be a calming influence at the point if they need it, but the biggest thing is knocking down the three ball.

I am really starting to appreciate Sean Mosley’s style of play.  It seems to me every game lately he has taken some nasty falls around the basket.  He gets in the paint on both ends of the floor.  He is tough, and seems to really know how to play.  I will be the first to admit I was down on him early in the season, but he is coming along.  He brings tremendous energy and I got a big laugh out of his chest bump with Vasquez after that 2 on 1 dunk.  Maybe I missed the whistle, but I felt like he was going to chest bump him even if there wasn’t going to be a time-out. 

Finally I am going to wrap this up by saying the team left it all out on the court for the entire game.  They seemed to have a higher energy level than Miami and really had fun playing.  I watched Sports Day on Comcast Sportsnet, and all the players were saying how they wanted to win this one so bad for Gary.   If I was coach Williams, I would be very proud of the effort and the way they played for me.  I think the team is kind of taking an us against the world mentality, and sometimes that is when Gary is at his best.  As I said in my little piece about why Gary should go, I would love to see him be able to fix things, but only time will tell if he is afforded that chance.  Go Terps!

Extra Droppings:

I know this is Bob’s thing (I need the readers to come up with a bonus section for me), but I thought it was worth mentioning Maryland commit, Jordan Williams was nominated for the McDonaldsAll-American Team.  Sure he is one of only 1,250 or so to garner the nomination, but we will have to take what we can get.  Also, in a game last week he had 50 points.    Looking forward to your arrival Mr. Jordan.

This entry was posted on Sunday, February 1st, 2009 at 7:53 am and is filed under Maryland Terps Basketball. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.