Maryland Basketball: Oliver's Twist

Clemson Tigers (20-7, 8-5) at
Maryland Terrapins (18-11, 8-6)
Comcast Center - College Park, MD

Ah, it’s March. The greatest month of the sports calendar. There will be enough basketball over the course of the next 31 days to keep even the most crazed college zealot satisfied…including yours truly. The only question that remains is how many games will the Maryland Terrapins be playing this month?

We know they’ll have at least four. There’s Clemson, a somewhat tough roadie to Virginia, the first ACC tournament game and another postseason game of some sort (Whether or not you count the NIT as an actual basketball game is up to you. I don’t. To me, the NIT is like every college bowl game except for the BCS Championship. It’s basically an exhibition). Other than that, it’s anyone’s guess. Maryland can’t play consistently for an entire month. They can’t play consistently for an entire week. Heck, they can’t play consistently for an entire half of basketball.

The Wake Forest game was a prime example of that. The Terps looked good for the first 10 minutes of the second half. They opened up an 11-point lead, they were attacking inside, getting Wake in foul trouble and threatening to blow the Deacons off their own home court. Then the Terps didn’t make a field goal for the final 9:10 of the game. Go figure. As simple as flipping a switch.

Miraculously, Maryland somehow won despite only making six free throws in the last nine minutes of the contest against Wake. Considering that Texas A&M had a similar dry spell last night, and lost to Oklahoma by 27 points, it could have been much, much worse for the Terps.

It’s getting really frustrating to watch. How many bad possessions can you sit through? Some of these passes wouldn’t be attempted by a high school team. Throws into triple-teams. Passes to a cutter that isn’t there. No one moving without the ball. If it was once in awhile, you chalk it up to good opposing defense. However, Maryland can go into these four, five, six minute funks. Or as we saw on Thursday, the droughts can last even longer than that.

At the very least, Maryland made a concerted effort to get the ball to James Gist. 31 points and 11 rebounds is more like it. Hopefully he won’t disappear for the next four games like after the last time he scored 30. Or, hopefully his teammates won’t forget about him.

I’ve talked about Maryland being a two man show. On Thursday against Wake, my point was again proven. Gist and Vasquez scored 55 of the team’s points. They shot 60% while the rest of the team shot 33%. They shot 50% from three, the rest of the team again shot 33%. They took all but two, and made all but one of the team’s free throws. They had nine assists while the rest of the team had four. It couldn’t be more obvious. I know that Boom Osby was sick, but someone else has to step up. Every once in awhile this season Osby has played a solid game. But where is the rest of the team? Five guys start, and three guys see plenty of time off the bench. So someone other than Gist and Vasquez is going to have to score with some consistency or Maryland won’t win with any.

Anyway, as we established in the beginning, it’s already March. Which means, at long last, Maryland gets their first look at the Clemson Tigers. Seriously, can’t we do just a little better scheduling the conference? Isn’t there a way to make sure every team plays each other once before teams play for a second time? Other conferences manage to do this. I know the ACC is relatively new to this whole unbalanced schedule, but it can’t be that hard to make sure Maryland faces each of the other 11 teams before their final five home-and-homes. Playing Clemson for the first time all season on March 2nd is unacceptable. As it turns out, this game against Clemson is sort of important.

Since the last time the Terps saw Clemson, and that was a long time ago, the Tigers have reinvented themselves into a NCAA tournament team. So these are no longer your older brother’s Tigers. These are no longer your father’s Tigers. These are no longer your great aunt’s Tigers. And they’ve managed to do so while still employing Oliver Purnell and his oddly-shaped head.

Clemson hasn’t been to the NCAA tournament since 1998. Rick Barnes was the coach and the program was extremely dirty. Along with Florida State, Clemson has long been the ugly stepchild of the ACC basketball program. In the last two seasons the Tigers have gotten off to strong starts, including going 19-0 last year, only to have complete collapses and miss the tourney both seasons. Like most people, I was astonished that Purnell wasn’t fired after last year’s implosion. It was one thing for him to lose because he couldn’t get talent to the boondocks of South Carolina and couldn’t compete with the North Carolina’s of the world at a perennial ACC-also ran. It was another thing to have talent on the roster, be the last remaining undefeated in the nation and still not get a tournament bid. I have said for the past two seasons that Purnell is by far the worst coach in the ACC. Much worse than Sidney Lowe. Somehow worse than Leonard Hamilton.

That being said, I’m not surprised at all that Clemson is going to make the NCAA tournament this season, even with Purnell still there. In fact, I said they would back in November on this very page. I predicted them to finish fourth in the conference, and with that finish, an easy bid.

The reason was simple. First, the Tigers were the oldest and most experienced team in the conference. That counts for a lot. Second, there is too much talent on the roster. More talent than even Purnell could waste. James Mays, Cliff Hammonds and K.C. Rivers are All-ACC caliber players on one level or another. Combine those players with guys like Trevor Booker, Terrence Oglesby, Demontez Stitt and Raymond Sikes, who are all quality roll players, it was impossible for the Tigers to miss the tournament playing in the watered down ACC. The fact that Mays struggles to get minutes shows you how deep, and how talented this team is. The only true power forward in the conference better than Mays is Gist, and Mays is only getting 26 minutes a game.

Rivers, Hammonds, Booker, Oglesby and Mays are all averaging double digits. Rivers, Booker and Mays each average 7 boards a game. Rivers, Hammonds, Mays and Stitt all average two assists or more per. The Tigers shoot an outstanding 46% from the field. Only Oglesby among the regulars is well under 40%. The team shoots 40% from three, with Hammonds, Rivers, Booker and Oglesby all shooting above that mark. Make no mistake about it, this is a deep, talented and balanced team.

Clemson has two glaring problems on its roster, which in part can explain why they’ve lost seven games this season. The first is their free throw shooting. The problems from the stripe are one of the reasons the Tigers have lost so many close games over the last few seasons. They’ve been a terrible free throw shooting teams for many years. Clemons is a touch under 63% from the stripe. Not good at all. Booker is 60%. Mays is an even 50% free throw shooter. Rivers shoots 66%, while Hammonds shoots 41%. Those are exceptionally low numbers for two starting guards. In fact, Hammonds shoots the exact same from beyond the arc than he does at the free throw line. Neither Rivers or Hammonds get to the line that often, which should be a red flag to Maryland. That tells you that these two are spot up shooters who don’t like to, or aren’t able to drive to the hoop. GUARD THE PERIMETER OR YOU WILL LOSE.

The second problem Clemson has is that they commit too many fouls. This team averages over 20 fouls per game. That is one of the reasons they have so much depth. Purnell has been forced to go to his bench a lot. So Clemson can’t shoot free throws, and they give better free throw shooting teams plenty of chances from the line.

Personally, I don’t think these problems will affect Clemson today. The Tigers are a much more talented version of Miami. Even with both Gist and Osby, Maryland doesn’t match up inside. The Tigers can throw wave after wave of big men at you. They should be able to neutralize Maryland inside and get both Gist and Osby in foul trouble. Also, the Terps have had problems guarding the perimeter as of late. As I said above, this the wrong team to leave open from three. Finally, Clemson forces a whole mess of turnovers and plays solid pressure defense. This is really the perfect storm and Maryland is George Clooney on a fishing boat. Even with the much better coach, there is little Gary can do against a much better team.

I do want to take this time to thank James Gist and Bambale Osby for their service to the Maryland program. Gist has become one of the most exciting forwards in the country. It’s been fun to watch him evolve from athletic freak to skilled post man. He is good in the classroom, stays out of trouble and works hard on the court. You couldn’t ask for much more from him. He has given his all for the Maryland program and it’s unfortunate that he didn’t have more talent around him. He certainly deserves one last trip to the NCAA tournament.

Osby has become a fan favorite over the past two seasons. His stats don’t show what he has meant to Maryland, especially this season. He is a character, and every team needs at least one of them (Maryland has one too many with Vasquez acting like moron almost every game). From the all out hustle every time he steps on the court, to the way he interacts with the fans, and of course, to the famous ‘fro, Osby is player that may be overlooked in the record books, but won’t be forgotten by Maryland fans.

Hopefully the rest of the Terps can help pickup the seniors on their day to shine. I just don’t think Maryland has enough to matchup with these Tigers.

Clemson 84
Maryland 73