COLLEGE PARK, Md. – The first week of April means a full-fledged shift to lacrosse for the umterps Notebook and this week we look at the crazy start to the Big Ten for men's lacrosse, the continued dominance of the women's lacrosse team and much more from the world of Maryland athletics.
Take Nothing For Granted With B1G Men's Lax
The Big Ten men's lacrosse schedule just kicked off this past weekend and if the first three games are any indication there's one thing that you can be assure of – nothing can be taken for granted.
We'll get to the Terps win at Michigan, but first lets touch on the other two Big Ten games in the opening weekend.
First, Rutgers welcomes Johns Hopkins into Piscataway for the first time since 1998 and promptly puts up 16 goals in a 16-9 thumping of the Blue Jays. The Scarlet Knights have more wins this season (8) than any other Big Ten team and are the only Big Ten team to rank among the top 20 in NCAA total offense and total defense.
Hopkins is struggling right now with a 5-4 mark, having lost two of their last three games, but we've been there done that with the Blue Jays. Never count them out.
On Sunday, Penn State, which wants to get up and down the field with high tempo, saw its high-powered offense kept in check, but the Nittany Lions managed to out-last Ohio State, 6-5 in Happy Valley.
The Buckeyes are 5-6 overall this season and play a key conference game this Saturday against Hopkins at Homewood Field. The loser of which will fall to 0-2 in league play, while the winner keeps its hopes alive at 1-1.
If you watched the Maryland-Michigan game on Saturday you might have thought this was being played in February, but it is April and the snow was coming down at Michigan Stadium.
It wasn't a masterpiece, but a win is a win and Maryland's 8-7 last-minute victory looks the same as any other in the win column. Sometimes its not about the style it's about the substance.
The Terps started out a bit slow and the Wolverines held a 3-1 lead after the first quarter and a 4-3 advantage at the half, but in the end Maryland's leaders stood up and made difference-making plays.
Kyle Bernlohr made a season-best 12 saves at Michigan, but none were more impressive than his stop of a rebound attempt by the Wolverines' Patrick Tracy with the game tied at 7-7 with 1:11 to go in the fourth. Bernlohr turned aside a big step-down shot by Mikie Schlosser, but the rebound bounced right in front of the goal. Tracy was there for the easy groundball and had nothing but open net in front of him, but Bernlohr recovered just enough to make a stab at the shot with the stick in his right hand and he plucked a sure-fire goal out of mid-air.
Maryland seemed to have an easy clear attempt following the save, but a mishandled pass put the ball on the turf. The ball squirted free during the scrum toward the middle of the field where senior Henry West scooped up the loose ball.
West made a simple pass to senior Bryan Cole, who was making a run down the left seam. Wolverine defender Andrew Hatton came out to cover Cole, but the crafty Canadian used some slight of hand to get to the inside of Hatton for a 1-on-1 with Michigan goalie Gerald Logan that Cole easily won to give Maryland the 8-7 lead with 43 seconds remaining.
But the game wasn't over yet. Michigan won the ensuing faceoff and Chase Young got off a good shot, but once again Bernlohr stood tall and made his final save of the day to preserve the victory.
After the first weekend of Big Ten play Maryland, Penn State and Rutgers are 1-0, while Hopkins, Michigan and Ohio State are 0-1.
The Terps and Nittany Lions face off this Sunday at 7 p.m. at the Penn State Lacrosse Field. Penn State likes to get up and down the field and wants to push tempo. Even with the low-scoring win over Ohio State, the Nittany Lions average 12.0 goals per game, which is 15th in the nation in scoring offense. Penn State also displays ball discipline and are the only team in the country averaging less than 10 turnovers per game.
Fans can catch the Maryland-Penn State battle live on the Big Ten Network or by streaming it on the BTN2Go app.
Bonus: First RPI Released by NCAA
Like the media or coaches polls, the mid-season RPI doesn't mean much in the end, but the RPI at least gives a snapshot of where teams stand with one of the official tournament committee benchmarks.
The Terps check into the first RPI at No. 2 behind only undefeated Brown and ahead of Yale and Notre Dame, which hold victories over Maryland. Defending NCAA champ Denver rounds out the top five.
One of the factors helping Maryland is strength of schedule. The Terps have already played Nos. 3 & 4 (Yale & ND, respectively) and have a win over No. 6 Albany. Maryland's final non-conference game of the year comes on April 19 vs. No. 10 Navy.
Penn State and Johns Hopkins are Nos. 11 and 12, respectively, which means Maryland will have or will play six of the top 12 teams.
Throw in games vs. Penn (No. 20, 13-8 win), High Point (No. 22, 15-10 win), Rutgers (No. 24, April 16 at home) and North Carolina (No. 25, 11-8 win) and the Terps have 10 of the top 25 teams on its 2016 schedule.
Michigan is the only team on Maryland's 2016 slate that is outside of the top 35 teams in the initial RPI.
Increasing The Gap
The Maryland women's lacrosse team continues to separate itself from its competition.
Last week, the undefeated Terps dominated rival No. 14 Northwestern, 17-4 and then went out and defeated a rising Cornell squad, 17-9. Last night Maryland rallied to top local rival Johns Hopkins, 10-8.
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This 2016 Terrapin team is impressive offensively and defensively, which we'll put into some historical perspective.
Maryland is 2nd in the nation in scoring offense with 15.2 goals per game. Only three other teams in Terps history have averaged more goals per game.
The 2000 team is the top scoring team in Maryland history and is the only team to average 16 or more goals per game at a statistical 16.0 (15.95 in actuality).
The undefeated 1999 team, which is in the running for the greatest team in the history of women's lacrosse, is second at 15.8 goals per game.
The only other team to top 15.0 goals per game is the 21-1 2009 Final Four team that averaged 15.6 goals per game. That squad was averaging 16.0 goals per game through its first 21 games, but the seven goals in the 8-7 semifinal loss to North Carolina dropped the average.
The unbeaten 2001 team looked to be close but checked in at 14.7 goals per game.
The thing that separates this year's team is its defense. The 2016 Terps are allowing 6.8 goals per game, which ranks eighth in the NCAA in scoring defense.
The 8.4 goals-per-game scoring margin ranks is tied for the second best in program history. Only the 1999 team was close in scoring margin at 8.9 goals per game.
The 2000 team's scoring margin was also 8.4 goals per game, while the 2001 team's was 7.4 goals per game.
The Terps return to Big Ten action on Saturday when they play at Rutgers at 7 p.m. Fans can watch the action with a BTN Plus subscription and the BTN2Go app.
All-America Terps
Basketball season might be over, but that just means the games have stopped – not the news.
Melo Trimble was named an Associated Press Honorable Mention All-American this past weekend, becoming the first Terp since Greivis Vasquez in 2010 to be an AP All-American.
The Maryland women's basketball team also picked up All-America honors for juniors Shatori Walker-Kimbrough and Brionna Jones. Walker-Kimbrough was named to the AP third team, while Jones earned honorable mention honors. Both Terps also earned Honorable Mention All-America honors from the Women's Basketball Coaches Association.
Quick Hitters:
• Maryland football head coach didn't wait long to find his new defensive coordinator after Scott Shaffer stepped down due to personal reasons. Durkin filled the hole in his staff with Andy Buh, who was the defensive coordinator at Stanford (where he was on the same staff as Durkin), Nevada and Cal before most recently serving as the outside linebackers coach at Kentucky. Buh (pronounced “Boo”) also has ties to the Big Ten, having coached the linebackers at Wisconsin in 2012.
• The Terps women's track team continues to rewrite the record book. First Micha Powell broke the 17-year-old school record in the 400m with a time of 52.49, which easily topped Candyce DeLoatch's previous mark of 53.16.
Powell then continued to etch her name in Maryland's records as a member of the sprint medley relay squad with senior Lisa Meneau, junior Catherine Voelpel and junior Alexandra Lucki to take down an 11-year-old mark with a time of 3:54.92 (besting the time of 3:55.37 set at the 2005 Penn Relays by Kierra Foster, Natasha Emmanuel, Renee Clarke and Danielle Siebert).
• The Maryland baseball team had a 3-2 week last week after sweeping a mid-week home-and-home with VCU and dropping two of three to High Point, which is 20-8 on the season. Marty Coates was named the Big Ten Freshman of the Week after slugging 1.000 with three home runs, two doubles and seven RBIs in the five games. Costes leads all Big Ten freshman, and the Maryland team, in home runs (6), slugging percentage (.573) and RBIs (23).
Fans can catch the Terps back in Big Ten action this weekend with a three-game series with Ohio State at Bob “Turtle” Smith Stadium.
Wrapping Up
That's it for this edition of the umterps Notebook. Don't forget to follow Maryland athletics on all of the social media platforms: Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
Patrick Fischer is the Director of Digital Media and Website Management for the University of Maryland Department of Intercollegiate AthleticsThe views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official position of the Maryland athletics department or its athletics programs.
