C.J. Leslie had 20 points and 11 rebounds and North Carolina State held on to beat Maryland 79-74 on Sunday night in their Atlantic Coast Conference opener.
Scott Wood scored 19 points and Lorenzo Brown added 11 for the Wolfpack (12-4, 1-0). They hit 47.5 percent of their shots - 28 of 59 - and were 21 of 24 from the free-throw line to win their sixth straight and snap the Terrapins' seven-game winning streak.
Mark Gottfried became the first N.C. State coach since Les Robinson in 1991 to win his first ACC game, and the surging Wolfpack have won seven of eight with the lone loss in that stretch coming to No. 1 Syracuse.
Terrell Stoglin scored 25 points - he entered averaging an ACC-best 21 - but the Terrapins (10-4, 0-1) dropped new coach Mark Turgeon's first ACC game.
The Terps were 26 of 60 for 43.3 percent shooting. They made up for 15 turnovers by hitting nine of their 21 attempts from 3-point range - but none in the final 13 1/2 minutes until Stoglin swished one with 3.6 seconds left to make it 77-74.
C.J. Williams made two free throws with 2.6 seconds remaining to ice it for N.C. State, which led the entire second half - never by fewer than three points - but couldn't push its lead out of single digits until late.
Leslie's three-point play during an 11-0 run gave the Wolfpack their first double-figure lead, 65-53, with 6:03 remaining. Brown's stickback of Richard Howell's missed jumper one minute later capped the burst and made it 67-53.
Maryland then reeled off nine straight points, pulling within 67-62 on Alex Len's layup with under 2 minutes remaining. Wood countered with a fadeaway jumper - N.C. State's first field goal since Brown's putback - to make it a seven-point game with 1:30 left.
Howell finished with 10 points for N.C. State, which ended a nine-game losing streak in the series and denied the Terps their first eight-game winning streak since 2006-07.
Len had 12 points and 11 rebounds and Sean Mosley added 12 points for Maryland.
This matchup lost a bit of juice with the offseason retirement of ex-Maryland coach Gary Williams. During the press conference last April that introduced Gottfried as coach, N.C. State athletic director Debbie Yow - who spent 16 years as Maryland's AD - was asked whether she had a reputation for being difficult to work with and she responded by saying Williams ''tried to sabotage the search'' at N.C. State.
