COLLEGE PARK, M.D. - Five straight in-and-outs in the early going for Maryland coupled with very sloppy offensive play had the Terrapins in a battle most were not expecting to be so evenly matched. 

 

Fairfield freshman guard Derek Needham and junior guard Lyndon Jordan seemed quicker and more alert than anyone else on the floor, breaking Maryland’s full court press rather easily and accounting for all of Fairfield’s points as they grabbed an 8-7 lead six minutes into the first half.

The home crowd was stunned momentarily for the first time this year as visiting Fairfield extended to a five point lead over the next three minutes, which included a semi-isolation play of Vasquez on Needham where Needham took Vasquez straight to the basket and Maryland’s young freshman "big-man" Jordan Williams was late to help as Needham was able to lay the ball in uncontested.

After an immediate Gary Williams timeout things began to settle in for the Terps.

“They did a good job of confusing us,” said Head Coach Gary Williams of his struggling team’s struggling offense. “They took us out of our sets because they kept switching defenses quite a bit out there. You don’t usually see that this early, but having been through it is good and we’ll learn a lot from this game.”

The crowd woke up and, while slowly, so did Maryland’s defense. Helped by Fairfield’s reciprocation of sloppy play, the Maryland defense began to pick up, putting pressure of actual consequence on Fairfield’s guards leading to 13 turnovers (key was a 10 second violation) and two missed close range shots.

“We did a good job on defense, we just couldn’t score,” said senior forward Landon Milbourne. “I don't think it was so much them stopping us as us being sloppy and just taking it for granted, thinking that we could score whenever we want which sometimes is not the case. Sometimes you have to run your offense and once we realized that we did ok.”

 After a Fairfield air ball, Maryland senior guard Eric Hayes was able to knock down a dagger three during a 15-0 run that gave Maryland a 10-point lead at 22-12. Hayes’ contribution was critical to the Maryland run as he scored 10 of the team's first 22 points.

“I thought he really played well,” said Coach Williams. “There was a certain toughness out there. He is such a study player that sometimes what he is doing gets overlooked. He looked really calm when things weren’t calm. He settled us down and set the offense.”

Maryland was able to answer some of the gaffs that peppered them last game by outrebounding Fairfield 19-17, including seven offensive, in the first half.

And even with Fairfield still battling hard Maryland finally closed them out 30-22 to end the half.

The second half was thoroughly dominated by Maryland, as well as, Needham shot attempts.

“They kept switching between man and zone and we were kind of confused because they were going to a 3-2 matchup which seems like a man,” explained sophomore guard Sean Mosley. “They switched every cut we ran and that definitely hurt our offense the first half (but in) the second half we picked the intensity up on defense and took it to them in the second half.”

Maryland was able to coral Needham in the second half and hold the rest of the Fairfield Stags to only 19.2% shooting. Maryland was then able to convert their defense into offense by shooting 45.5% from the field in the second half and scoring 21 points off turnovers for the game en route to a final score of 71-42.

DCSB GAME NOTES:

- With the two three-pointers he hit in the game, Hayes became 7th all-time in Maryland history for three pointers made; passing Sarunas Jasikevicius (1995-98)

- The Terps recorded their 101st win at Comcast Center (101-24)

- Vasquez recorded his 500th rebound making him the only player in Terps history to record 500 rebounds (502) and 500 assists (583)
Next game is on November 20, at 8:00 pm against New Hampshire. It will be the last game before the Terps travel to Lahaina, Hawaii for the EA Sports Maui Invitational