Men's Basketball Preseason Notes
10/10/2001 8:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
MARYLAND PRESEASON BASKETBALL NOTES
Entering The Season -- The Terrapins enter the 2001-02 campaign a consensus Top 5 pick by national preview publications ... One outlet, CollegeInsider.com, has picked Maryland as the No. 1 team in the country ... The vast majority of publications pick Maryland as the No. 2, No. 3 or No. 4 team in preseason polls ... Returning starters Lonny Baxter, Juan Dixon and Steve Blake all have been selected among the top competitors at their respective positions in preview publications ... Baxter and Dixon have each been selected for the second straight season as preseason nominees for the Wooden and Naismith national player of the year awards ...
USA Basketball Recap -- Lonny Baxter and Juan Dixon both starred for USA Basketball in August at the 2001 World University Games ... they led the U.S. to a bronze medal, after falling to China in the semifinal round ... Dixon led the club in points and steals, averaging 19.3 points and 3.0 steals per game ... Dixon's 24 steals broke Allen Iverson's USA WUGs previous record of 20, in 1995 ... Dixon led the U.S. with 24.3 minutes per game and shot 17-of-19 from the foul stripe ... his five 3FGs in the bronze medal game vs. Germany also set a U.S. single-game mark ... Baxter was the team's leading rebounder with 6.3 per game, and he led the squad with a 69.8 percent shooting clip from the field ... He was second to Dixon in the scoring column with 15.0 points per game, including a game-high 27 in the team's opening game against Iran ...
Off The Court -- Maryland junior Tahj Holden has been selected as the vice-president of the Student-Athlete Advisory Council (SAAC) for the Atlantic Coast Conference ... Chosen as a member of Maryland's SAAC last spring, he was later voted as the president of the Maryland council ... He was chosen during September as the ACC's SAAC vice-president ... The Maryland SAAC is sponsoring a canned food drive to benefit the Capital Area Food Bank, which will take place at Midnight Madness on Oct. 12 ... Students and fans are encouraged to bring canned food items for donation ... Cans will be collected outside all entrances to Cole Field House on Friday evening for Midnight Madness activities ... Doors open at 9 p.m. ...
ESPN College Sports Century -- ESPN Classic is presenting a new sports feature series in 2001-02, focusing on college athletes ... Twenty (20) features are being produced including a story on the Terps' Juan Dixon ... the Dixon feature as part of ESPN College Sports Century is scheduled to air in January ...
Coach of the Year -- When Playboy Magazine unveils its 2001-02 preseason All-America Team in November, it will announce Maryland coach Gary Williams as its selection as the 2001 National Coach of the Year ... It marks the fourth time that Williams has been recognized as at least a finalist for various national coach of the year awards ...
Terps' Best Era -- Gary Williams and the 2001 Terrapins have established the current era as the best in Maryland history ... The Terps' 78 wins since the 1999 campaign (28-6, 25-10, 25-10) is the best three-year stretch in history ... Maryland has won 99 games from 1998 to 2001 (21-11, 28-6, 25-10, 25-10) to establish the best four-year stretch in history ... With the West Region championship win over Stanford, the Terps established the best five-year stretch in Maryland history, winning 120 games since 1997 (21-11, 21-11, 28-6, 25-10, 25-10) ...
Consistency And Excellence -- Maryland is the only school in the nation that has achieved each of the following: [1] appeared in each of the last eight NCAA Tournaments, [2] advanced to at least five Sweet 16s during that span, and [3] won at least 25 games over each of the past three seasons ...
25 Wins In Three, 20 Wins In Five -- For the first time in Maryland history, the Terrapins have won at least 25 games in three consecutive seasons ... the three-year streak is matched by just five other schools in the country (Duke, Michigan State, Stanford, Cincinnati and Gonzaga) ... The Terps also have won at least 20 games in five straight seasons, matching the best previous run in school history, from 1972-76 ...
Consecutive Appearances And Sweet Sixteens -- Maryland is one of just nine schools to earn bids in each of the last eight NCAA Tournaments (Arizona, Cincinnati, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Maryland, North Carolina, Temple and UCLA) ... The Terps are also one of just seven schools to reach the Sweet Sixteen five times since 1994 (Arizona, Connecticut, Duke, Kansas, Kentucky, Maryland, UCLA) ...
ACC Prominence -- The Terrapins have finished in the top half of the ACC standings in eight consecutive seasons, including the past four in either the second or third position ... Maryland has won at least 10 games in the ACC regular season in a school-record four consecutive seasons ...
Williams Is One Of Four -- Maryland coach Gary Williams is one of just four coaches who not only boast an active streak of eight consecutive NCAA Tournaments, but who also have advanced to at least five Sweet Sixteen appearances during those five years ... The others are Lute Olson, Tubby Smith and Roy Williams ... Olson, Smith and Gary Williams are the only three to reach the Final Four during that period ...
Williams And Winningest Milestones -- Gary Wiliams is 13-8 in NCAA Tournament games while at Maryland, surpassing Lefty Driesell as the winningest in Maryland history ... Overall, Williams is one win from tying his own Maryland coach, Bud Millikan, as the second-winningest coach in Terp history ... Millikan retired following the 1967 season with 243 wins ... Williams currently boasts 242 wins in 12 years at Maryland ... Williams is also one win from earning the 450th of his 24-year head coaching career ... Williams also is just one ACC victory from becoming the 10th ACC coach in history, and just the second from Maryland, to reach 100 regular season conference wins ... Counting ACC regular season wins, Williams is on target for 2002 to pass such ACC coaching legends as Norm Sloan (103) and Vic Bubas (106) ... He enters the 2001-02 season as the eighth-winningest coach in ACC history, overall ...
Nation's Longest Streak -- Maryland owns the nation's longest non-conference homecourt win streak which spans 77 games and more than 11 years ... The Terps' last non-league home defeat was Dec. 12, 1989 vs. Coppin State ... The streak began on Dec. 30, 1989 against Alcorn State ... The Terps' most recent win in the streak was a 68-60 win over No. 15 Oklahoma on Feb. 24 of last season ... The streak will be tested early again in 2001-02, with a Nov. 27 date looming with Illinois as part of the ACC/Big Ten Challenge ...
Dixon Three-Timer And Theft Leader -- Senior guard Juan Dixon can become the first Terrapin since John Lucas to earn first team All-ACC citations in three consecutive seasons ... Lucas won the award in 1974, 1975, 1976 ... He also can match Lucas by becoming the only other player to lead Maryland in scoring in three consecutive seasons ... Dixon also can become the third player in league history to lead the circuit in steals in three straight seasons, matching Wake Forest's Tyrone Bogues and NC State's Chris Corchiani ... Dixon has led the league with 2.7 and 2.6 steals as a sophomore and junior, respectively ... Dixon helped Maryland become the first school ever to boast the ACC steals leader in four straight seasons ... Overall, Maryland has claimed the ACC steals leader in seven of the last eight years ... Dixon enters his final campaign at ninth in ACC history, 103 steals shy of Maryland and league record-holder Johnny Rhodes' 344 ...
Blake's Assists -- Speaking of the first time since Lucas, junior point guard Steve Blake led the ACC in assists last season to become the first Maryland player to do so since Lucas ... Blake, meanwhile, is on pace to challenge the ACC's and the NCAA's best assist-makers of all-time ... With 465 assists through two seasons and a school-record 248 in 2001, Blake is on pace to move among the top five in ACC history, and perhaps just the fourth to reach 1,000 for a career ... The only other three to reach 1,000, Duke's Bobby Hurley, NC State's Corchiani and North Carolina's Ed Cota, currently 1-2-3 in the NCAA record book, also ... Blake needs just 185 assists to surpass Keith Gatlin as the Maryland career assists leader ... Blake is on pace to challenge distinction as the first player in Div. I history to boast 1,000 points and 1,000 assists ...
Baxter, Elmore And 1,500/1,000 -- Lonny Baxter enters his senior season with 710 career rebounds, currently 13th on the Terps' all-time list ... With 308 and 286 in his past two seasons, he has his sights set on becoming the only Maryland player besides Len Elmore to eclipse 1,000 rebounds in a career ... He should also become the first Terrapin ever to eclipse 1,500 points and 1,000 rebounds ... He capped his junior season by earning the first NCAA Regional MVP honor in Maryland history ...
Player Miscellany -- Juan Dixon can surpass graduated co-captain Mike Mardesich with the most games and victories in a Maryland career ... He needs 33 games and 22 wins to set new records ... Dixon begins 2001-02 13th on the Terps' career scoring chart, followed by Baxter in 19th ... Maryland begins the 2001-02 season with three 1,000-point scorers on the roster: Dixon (1,534), Baxter (1,325) and Byron Mouton (1,072) ... It is the first time that a Maryland team has ever begun the season with that claim ... The Terps also could place three players over 100 career 3-point FGs this season, with Dixon already at 147 and within reach of the school record, Steve Blake at 74 and Drew Nicholas at 65 ... Three players, Baxter, Dixon and Tahj Holden, spent the summer in USA tryouts and training camp for the World University Games ... Camp runs Aug. 10-17, with the Games taking place Aug. 22-Sept. 1 in Beijing, China ...
Comcast And Cole Attendance -- The Terps will play one final season, their 47th, at Cole Field House before opening in the 17,100-seat Comcast Center for 2002-03 ... Maryland finished the 2000-01 regular season with an attendance average of 14,058 - 96.9 percent of its capacity of 14,500 and ranked 18th in the country ... Only three times in the building's storied history have the Terps averaged over 14,000 for a season - 1999, 2000 and 2001 ... Maryland has ranked in the Top 20 among national attendance leaders for four straight seasons ... Maryland has averaged more than 13,000 fans in each of its last seven seasons ... During the last eight seasons, the Terps have achieved eight of their top nine single-season home attendance averages in history ... Maryland basketball teams will play in the Comcast Center beginning in the 2002-2003 season, thanks to a $20 million naming rights gift to the university announced on Jan. 5, 1999 ... In summer 2000, Comcast increased its gift by $5 million in order to include naming rights on the floor ...The gift is part of a business partnership that also includes the provision of cable television services to university residence halls ...The Comcast gift is the largest single donation ever to the flagship campus, and it matches the largest known corporate naming gift in the United States for a college athletic facility ... The $25 million represents a significant portion of the university's share of the cost of construction on the planned $124 million arena, which is being constructed on the north side of the campus under the auspices of the Maryland Stadium Authority.
