COLLEGE PARK, Md. (AP) -- Having grown weary of chasing North Carolina (No. 11 ESPN/USA Today, No. 9 AP) up and down the court, Maryland knew it had to do something different in the second half. So the Terrapins cranked up the defense Wednesday night and worked to keep a step ahead of the Tar Heels. The result: a gratifying 90-84 upset victory for a young but determined squad. Jamar Smith scored 22 points, John Gilchrist had 20 and Nik Caner-Medley added 17 for Maryland (10-3, 1-1 Atlantic Coast Conference). After yielding a season-high 49 points in the first half, Maryland put the clamps on a powerful offense that surpassed 100 points in each of its first two conference games. "The first half we matched them basket for basket," Smith said. "The coaches told us to keep playing our defense, and that's what we did in the second half." http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/recap?gameId=240140120
Conference play is really showing what teams like North Carolina, Marquette, and others are made of. I'll buy into the fact that anyone can beat anyone on any given night, but North Carolina has been dissapointing in ACC play. North Carolina has Connecticut, Florida State, and Virginia coming up. They could very well lose two or maybe even all of those games. It just goes to show you that the teams with the most pro-caliber talent aren't always the best college teams.
Ouch. That loss really hurt. That was a very big game, and Carolina really couldn't afford to lose one like that, especially not to Maryland, which looks like a dark horse contender for the ACC title. If they can keep up this strong play, they could add Duke and Carolina to a pile of March victims.
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting Wave:</div><div class="quote_post">Conference play is really showing what teams like North Carolina, Marquette, and others are made of. I'll buy into the fact that anyone can beat anyone on any given night, but North Carolina has been dissapointing in ACC play. North Carolina has Connecticut, Florida State, and Virginia coming up. They could very well lose two or maybe even all of those games. It just goes to show you that the teams with the most pro-caliber talent aren't always the best college teams.</div> True dat. That shows exactly what playing team basketball can do for ya. A few cats in the L could learn from it.
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting starman85:</div><div class="quote_post">Ouch. That loss really hurt. That was a very big game, and Carolina really couldn't afford to lose one like that, especially not to Maryland, which looks like a dark horse contender for the ACC title. If they can keep up this strong play, they could add Duke and Carolina to a pile of March victims.</div> I don't know. I think Duke is a totally different animal from UNC. I think we can attribute part of UNC's ups and downs to the fact that Roy is new(well new but still old in the carolina way lol) in town and everyone is still kinda feelin' each other out. Duke can shutdown Maryland with it's D. But we'll see. I can't wait til tourney time.
<div class="quote_poster">Quoting Big Nasty:</div><div class="quote_post">I don't know. I think Duke is a totally different animal from UNC. I think we can attribute part of UNC's ups and downs to the fact that Roy is new(well new but still old in the carolina way lol) in town and everyone is still kinda feelin' each other out. Duke can shutdown Maryland with it's D. But we'll see. I can't wait til tourney time.</div> You're right, we'll only see come tourney time. But I think that Carolina is easily as good as, if not better than Duke, even with Roy's relative newness, especially with the players. But I think he's already shown that his new system works better than Daugherty's system that the players knew well, so most of the kinks are out. I have a feeling that Gilchrist is gonna give Duhon quite a bit of trouble just with his style, and Maryland matches up very well with Duke, so I'm not sure that their vaunted D will do that much, especially if Gary Williams can get his troops moving fast. If Duke controls the tempo from the start, than that's a different matter. But what Maryland did against Carolina, they could quite easily do to most every team in the nation. They are truly underrated right now, and will break a few more hearts.
