Terps roll past Rams 98-55

For about 18 minutes Winston-Salem State stood toe-to-toe with ACC heavyweight Maryland on Tuesday night, but then the knockout blow came in a hurry.

The Terps, behind senior Greivis Vasquez, pounded the Rams to the tune of 98-55 at the Comcast Center. Despite the fans wanting their team to reach 100 points, Coach Gary Williams instructed his team to hold the ball with about 11 seconds left.

What surprised center Paul Davis of the Rams wasn't how good Vasquez played (27 points, 11 assists, eight rebounds and three steals), but how good everybody else on the Terps shot the ball.

"Their shooting was really great tonight and we knew (Vasquez) was going to get his points but everybody shoot really well for them," Davis said. "They just had a good shooting night."

The Rams used a pretty effective zone early in the game, and it forced the Terps (7-3) to do their damage from the outside. The Terps wound up not scoring any points in the paint in the first half, which prompted Williams to make a point at halftime.

And the Terps came out to start the second half and got the ball inside early and often, and continued to shoot well from the outside. For the game the Terps shot 57 percent, and were 12 of 18 on 3-pointers.

Coach Bobby Collins of the Rams, whose team fell to 2-7, tried to mix up his defenses in the second half but nothing worked.

"I don't even think that they thought they could shoot the ball that well," Collins said about the Terps. "They were 12 of 18 on 3-pointers, and you aren't going to win games when an opponent shoots like that."

Four other Terps scored in double figures led by Cliff Tucker, who came off the bench to score 13 and was 5 of 5 shooting. Three of those shots were 3-pointers.

Guard Lamar Monger of the Rams said that they had trouble keeping up with the Terps once they got it rolling. Over the final two minutes of the half and the first seven minutes of the second half the Terps went on a 41-5 run that ended any chance the Rams might have of making it a close game.

"He's a great player," Monger said about Vasquez, one of the top players in the ACC. "He's very smart and he makes them go."

The Rams made it interesting early and with 3:13 left in the half trailed just 33-29 after Brian Fisher's layup. But the Terps closed the half with an 8-0 run as Vasquez forced a turnover at midcourt as Andrew Jackson tried to split a double team on a pass attempt. Vasquez went in for the dunk, and then later hit a 3-pointer before making a nice pass to Tucker who made a 3-pointer to complete the 8-0 run.

Vasquez, who said he was in a slump of late, joked that he was disappointed he missed getting a triple-double by two rebounds.

"I just want to win, that's all that matters to me," he said.

The Rams, meanwhile, are still searching for that elusive victory against a Division I school this season. And it won't get any easier next week with a game at Georgia Tech.

Davis, who led the Rams with 15 points and seven rebounds, said that playing in front of the always-charged up Maryland students was fun. Even though the school is on break, there were plenty of students at the game who surrounded the court.

"The atmosphere was great and I fed off it," Davis said. "So it didn't intimidate me at all."

What did intimidate the Rams was when the Terps turned on their defensive pressure. The Rams wound up with 19 turnovers, many off the halfcourt and full-court traps.

"I thought we competed," Collins said. "For about 18 minutes we were right there, but then they started a run and Drew had that turnover in the backcourt that led to a dunk and that started it."

The Rams actually tied the game at 12 with 12:50 left in the half when Shelton Carter hit a 3-pointer from the baseline. That quieted the Maryland fans, at least for a little while.

Collins said that he saw some positives despite the 43-point loss.

"It's an ACC school, so I'm not going to say the season is over because of this game," Collins said. "I thought we competed and played like we are capable of for a little while."

Williams, whose Terps were playing their first game in 10 days, said: "I think we had to play through some rust, while at the same time Winston-Salem State was playing pretty good basketball. They have some quickness that caused problems early."

Collins said that Carter, who has been struggling of late, needs to find his scoring touch again. At one point early in the game Carter fired up a long air-ball and for the rest of the game the Maryland students chanted "air ball" every time he touched it.

"We have to get Shelton playing better and he hasn't given us much of anything," Collins said. "And we need some others to be more aggressive."

jdell@wsjournal.com



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