Mark Turgeon and his Maryland Terrapins are halfway through the ACC season, and the first half hasn't been that kind to the team. Saturday's 83-74 loss to fifth-ranked North Carolina was Maryland's fifth setback in the last six games. The Terrapins fell to 13-9 overall and 3-5 in league play.
"The kids are growing up," Turgeon said of his team's progress after a recent span that has included tough losses to powerhouses Carolina and Duke, plus a double-overtime defeat at Miami Wednesday. "We're just not there yet."
The Terps stopped Duke's perimeter game but got dominated inside. Against, North Carolina, Maryland shut down the Tar Heels' dominating fast break but got killed on the offensive glass. And the young Terps -- seven players in their top nine are sophomores or younger -- haven't won at all on the road yet, now 0-4 in actual road contests.
Uh-oh. Three of the next four games are away from Comcast Center, beginning Tuesday at Clemson. The Terps are at Duke on Saturday.
"It's real frustrating and we just have to learn from it," guard Terrell Stoglin said of the spate of tough losses. "We're a young team. We're real close. We fought against Duke, we were right there. We fought against Carolina, we were right there. We just have to finish."
Stoglin, who had a career high 33 points at Miami, led Maryland again with 20 against UNC. After a 10-4 start in games in which Stoglin, the ACC's leading scorer, had scored 20 or more points, the Terps have lost two in a row in that circumstance and must find him offensive help.
Or, perhaps more accurately, they have to get Stoglin to find -- and trust -- his teammates more on that end. Maryland led at the half against the tall, talented Tar Heels but shot less than 39 percent in the second half and just couldn't keep North Carolina off the glass.
"I was disappointed in some of the things we did down the stretch," Stoglin said. "The reason we were so good the first half: balanced scoring. And that's the only way you're going to beat great teams."
After Stoglin's league-leading (through Feb. 5) 21.7 scoring average, senior Sean Mosley is next at just 10.1, followed by forward James Padgett (9.0). An encouraging sign Saturday was 7-foot-1 freshman Alex Len scoring 12 points and upping his average to 7.5. It was Len's most offensive performance in nine games.
He could be a big factor for the Terps down the stretch, giving the team more ways to score. That's the kind of progress that could help Maryland break through on the road.
NOTES, QUOTES
--Freshman center Alex Len had his second straight strong game with 12 points and nine rebounds against UNC. He had 11 points and seven rebounds at Miami on Wednesday. The slumping Len had scored just eight points in the five games prior to Miami, and he had just five rebounds in the previous four contests.
--Freshman Nick Faust continues to give the team a lift off the bench with his defense and his ability to create offensively off the dribble. He had 11 points against UNC and is averaging eight points a game over the last seven contests. He and Len were the big reasons Maryland had a 24-6 edge in bench scoring over the Tar Heels.
--Senior Sean Mosley scored 11 points against North Carolina and is now just one shy of 1,000 career points. When he reaches that milestone, he will be just the eighth player in school history with 1,000 points, 500 rebounds, 200 assists and 120 steals.
--ACC scoring leader Terrell Stoglin had four assists Saturday, equaling his season high. He had just six assists combined in the previous four contests.
--Saturday's contest also featured a meeting between the ACC's top two offensive rebounders. James Padgett trails Zeller overall, 4.1-3.7, but he had four offensive boards to Zeller's three Saturday. Unfortunately those were Padgett's only rebounds in the game, a factor that contributed to Carolina's whopping 19 offensive rebounds.
FUTURES MARKET
F Ashton Pankey moved back into the starting lineup when 7-1 Alex Len injured his ankle, and coach Mark Turgeon seems to like bringing Len off the bench to tamp down fans' oversized expectations of the Ukrainian freshman. Meanwhile, the 6-9 Pankey, who started six of the first 10 games of the season, has taken advantage to play well in his two recent starts. He just missed a double-double with eight points and a career-high 11 points against Virginia Tech.
He has developed some low-post moves to become more of an offensive factor, and he is technically the team's best rebounder, strong, quick to the ball and with big hands. The Terrapins seem to go to him on the low block early each game to establish him, but then often get away from consistently passing him the ball. Pankey, who played for Bob Hurley at famed St. Anthony (N.Y.) High School, is steadily improving after missing all of last season with a stress fracture.
PLAYER NOTES
--Sean Mosley played 32 minutes Saturday and became the 21st player in Maryland basketball history over 3,000 career minutes. Mosley has played 120 games in his Terrapin career, starting 96 times. He had 15 points Saturday, his ninth double-figure scoring game of the season.
--Terrell Stoglin scored 20-or-more points for the 14th time this season with 28 against the Hokies. Maryland is 10-4 when Stoglin scores 20 or more. His 21.3 ppg average continues to lead the ACC.
--Freshman Nick Faust had six points, six rebounds and three assists against Tech, many of those stats accumulated in a key first half run that helped Maryland open a working margin they would never relinquish. When Tech went with a larger lineup in the second half, the Terps' 6-6 swingman didn't get as many minutes and never got back in the flow, according to Turgeon. Faust has become the Terps' sixth man, the coach lauding his play often.
--F James Padgett hasn't had more than four rebounds in any of Maryland's last four games. North Carolina's Tyler Zeller (4.1) has passed Padgett's average of 3.8 offensive rebounds per game to lead the ACC in that category. The 6-8 Padgett is second.
