Photo: Photo by Hana Kaufman/Maryland Terrapins
By Noah Ploff
As we creep toward the start of the men’s college basketball season, teams will have some final tests against real in-game competition. Coming off a less-than-stellar season last year with a record of 12-21, Coach Buzz Williams and the Terps face high expectations to right the ship and steer themselves in the right direction.
Two Exhibition Wins
The Maryland men’s basketball team recently played two exhibition games, emerging victorious in both.
Georgia Tech: Hot Start, Defense
They first played Georgia Tech at UMBC to get the feel of an away game. The team started off hot, scoring 45 points in the first half and only surrendering 24. While the offense showed out with a strong scoring performance, the defense was also very strong, holding Georgia Tech to 24% shooting in the first half and 38% overall. As a team, the Terps managed to steal the ball 13 times as well. On the offensive side of the ball, four players reached double-digit scoring as the ball was being shared all around the court.
Eleven of the fourteen players who entered the game for Maryland were able to score points. Pharrel Payne was the top performer in the game with sixteen points, nine rebounds, two assists, and three steals. Payne is coming back from a season-ending leg injury last year. He received a medical redshirt and is now playing in his last season with the Terps.
West Virginia OT Comeback
The second exhibition game didn’t have a hot start like the previous one. At halftime, the Terps were losing by 15 points to the West Virginia Mountaineers. The second half is where they really turned up their game on both sides of the ball. Maryland outscored West Virginia 44-29 and tied the game at 75 at the end of regulation. Overtime came, and the Terps dominated and won by a final score of 90-81.
Andre Mills and Pharrel Payne exploded, both scoring over 25 points for Maryland. Payne was a monster on the boards, fighting his way to 13 rebounds, 10 of those being on the offensive end. This is a very strong come-from-behind win to add some momentum going into the regular season for the Terps.
Looking Ahead to Bucknell
Coming off two solid wins, the Terrapins will have just under two weeks to practice and prepare for their first opponent in the regular season, Bucknell, at home at XFINITY Center. Coach Buzz Williams will look to ride the momentum gained from these two exhibition victories and use it to power the team through their opponents. The team will also look to use their star freshmen more, such as Baba Oladotun and Austin Brown. They weren’t able to get much success in the exhibition games, so Coach Williams will try to use their strengths to get them comfortable and have them gain confidence so that they can live up to their potential and expectations.
