When Maryland announced its move to the Big Ten a howl arose from significant segments of the fan base. Some of the loudest caterwauling came from lacrosse fans and understandably so. The Terps planned to leave the strongest lacrosse conference in the NCAA for one that would be in its first season. Terps fans felt some combination of relief (and perhaps a touch of horror) when the B1G announced it had a new affiliate member for lacrosse only none other than Maryland’s great rival the Johns Hopkins Blue Jays. Suddenly, the Big Ten became an automatic qualifying (AQ) league.
So what relevance, you may wonder, does this have all of this have on Maryland’s NCAA quarterfinals rematch with North Carolina. Take a look at the bracket. Eight teams remain. One thing I want you to notice is that three of those teams are B1G squads and the same number come from the ACC. So, perhaps the change did’t result in quite the drop-off some folks might have expected.
In 2015, Maryland had played one ACC team and finished with a perfect 1-0 record. To reach Championship Weekend for the fourth time in John Tillman’s five years as head coach the Terps will need a repeat win over the North Carolina Tar Heels. Before we look ahead, let’s take a brief look back to March 21, 2015.
Maryland 10 – North Carolina 8
In a game that like wouldn’t have been played had the NCAA not been intent on helping to spread the sport, the Terps and Tar Heels met in Santa Ana, California (I can’t tell you if it was windy). The game was even through the first quarter with each squad finding the net twice.
In the critical second quarter, Maryland’s defense held the very potent UNC offense scoreless while the found the net three times with two coming from Colin Heacock and Joe LoCascio adding his second of the game. The Terps led 5-2 at the half.
Each team scored twice in the third quarter matching their output from the first. Both Maryland scores came from the crosse of LoCascio who added a fifth goal in the fourth quarter. LoCascio’s goals put the Terps up 7-2 but the Tar Heels showed the explosiveness of their offense scoring twice in the last minute of the quarter.
The Terps’ three goals in the fourth scored by Bobby Gribbin, LoCascio, and Heacock were sparked in significant part by Maryland’s ability to control the game at the faceoff dot. The Terps and Charlie Raffa won six of eight in the quarter and 15 of 22 for the game.
One other key was the play of Kyle Bernlohr in goal. The Ohio junior picked up 11 saves while conceding just eight goals. Three of those cam in UNC’s hectic fourth period comeback effort. With the 10-8 win, Maryland became the first and one of only two teams this season to hold the Tar Heels under 10 goals. The other was the Syracuse Orange in their 9-8 first round win in the ACC Tournament.
Looking ahead
Both teams enter the game with identical 13-3 records but they reached those marks playing very different styles and, one might say with very different results. As noted above, Carolina had only two games when they scored fewer than 10 goals. Maryland had five and needed an overtime win to avoid a sixth. Maryland has played four games decided by one goal while UNC has played two. Maryland’s record is a perfect 4-0. The Tar Heels have an inverse perfect record in one goal games. They are 0-2.
Some things have changed since that first match-up and some things haven’t changed quite as much. On the Tar Heels side, head coach Joe Breschi appears to have settled on a first line midfield of Chad Tutton, Steve Pontrello, and Shane Simpson. Simpson and Pontrello have both lost games to injury throughout the season. Patrick Kelly and Peyton Klawinski started in the first game against the Terps now both come off the bench as part of the second midfield. Tillman said the lineup and rotation are closer to the ones Carolina used last season.
What hasn’t changed is the dynamic three headed attack monster of Luke Goldstock (49 goals/17 assists), Jimmy Bitter (39 goals/16 assists) and Joey Sankey (31 goals/37 assists). Add in Tutton’s 33 goals and you have four Tar Heels who have collectively scored only 11 fewer goals than the entire Terrapins roster.
For Maryland, what’s changed isn’t particularly heartening. The Terps had a seven game stretch in the middle of the season when their defense was all but impregnable. They gave up just 30 goals over that seven game span and eight of those came in the game against North Carolina – a team that averaged over 15 goals per game in their other 15 games. In the six games since that stretch ended, Maryland has conceded 58 goals.
Against UNC, LoCascio and Heacock combined to score eight of Maryland’s 10 goals. Since then, what scoring the Terps have mustered has come from a balanced spread of players. Maryland has seven double digit goal scorers ranging from Dylan Maltz’s 10 to Matt Rambo’s team leading 33.
What Maryland needs to do to win
Yes, yes, I know. They need to have scored at least one more goal at the end of than North Carolina. This is the speculation regarding what aspects of the game they need to control in order to accomplish that.
First, win faceoffs. In the first meeting, Maryland won 15 of 22 faceoffs. That’s seven possessions the Tar Heels didn’t have in a two goal contest. In the Heels’ loss to Syracuse, the Orange won 14 of 21 faceoffs. The Tar Heels did win the faceoff battle with Notre Dame 18-15 but the Fighting Irish have an offense that can eradicate that differential. Maryland doesn’t. For the season, the Heels win only 49.2 percent of their faceoffs. Maryland must exploit this.
And that comes down to Charlie Raffa. Raffa has both played through injury and has missed games because of injuries. Tillman has said that Maryland is a different team when Raffa pays and is effective. “The early returns (on how he felt) on Sunday were pretty positive,” Tillman said. He added, “We’re going to see a heavy dose of him this Sunday. I thought he got better as the game went on.”
Second, value possessions. In their first round game against Yale, the Terps had 12 turnovers many of which occurred on simple ball exchanges and were unforced. The Terps can’t afford to give back any advantage they might gain winning faceoffs with sloppy play and unforced turnovers. Carolina will extract a price. Tillman said he has told his team in practice this week, “If we’re going to turn the ball over that many times, we’re really not going to be in this thing very long.”
Third, move the ball on offense. Though the Terps escaped with a win over Yale in their first NCAA game, the offense stagnated for the better part of two quarters. A Maryalnd attacker’s crosse was the place the ball went to die. It’s no accident or coincidence that three of Maryland’s four fourth quarter goals had assists credited and six of Maryland’s 10 goals in their win were assisted. Ball movement and player movement, Maryland needs both.
Fourth, get strong goalkeeping. Here are some numbers: 11/8 and 14/8. Those represent the saves versus goals scored in two of UNC’s three losses. As it was with faceoffs, the loss at Notre Dame is an outlier. Notre Dame scored 15 goals. If the Terps need to score 15 goals to win, they won’t.
Maryland goalie Kyle Bernlohr seemed to suffer a bit of a slump against Johns Hopkins and in the second half of the B1G Tournament game against Ohio State. Both teams scored efficiently. The defense in front of Bernlohr has to force Carolina into shots that are “saveable.” All we are saying… Is give Kyle a chance.
What North Carolina needs to do to win
This blog is called Terp Talk. I don’t give a spit what Carolina has to do.
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