The 3rd-ranked Maryland Terrapins, making their highly-anticipated 2015-16 home debut, mauled the Mount St. Mary’s Mountaineers 80-56 at an ecstatic Xfinity Center.
To their credit, the Mountaineers kept the game close in the first half as they went 7-19 from three point range.
The Terps (1-0) leading 43-32 at the break then watched as Mountaineer BK Ashe sank a three to make the score 49-40 with 15:59 to play in the game.
Then the Terrapins, who have been ranked as high as #1 in pre-season polls, took control of the game.
A Jared Nicken’s three made the score 54-40 and Duke-transfer Rasheed Sulaimon followed with a bucket to increase the lead to 56-40. A Jake Layman three pointer made the score 59-41 and a Melo Trimble drive and finish gave the Terps their largest lead of the game at 61-41.
This all part of a 12-1 run that put the game away with 10:12 to go as the Terps cruised to their 39th straight home-opening victory.
The Terrapins had five players in double figures, led by Layman who had 16 points on 7-10 shooting from the floor and his alley-oop slam dunk from new-Terp guard Jaylen Brantley gave his team a 71-51 lead with 5:37 to which was just too much of a hill to climb for the Mountaineers.
The Terps had their largest lead of the game after a dunk by Michal Cekovsky at 80-54 with 1:12 to play in the game. He came off the bench and scored eight points and corralled two rebounds.
Trimble, the pre-season Big Ten player of the year, scored 14 points and had two assists. He left the game early in the second half and never returned after landing awkwardly after a drive to the basket.
Terrapin sharpshooter Nickens finished with 11 points while going 3-5 from three-point range. Transfer Robert Carter Jr. and five-star freshman recruit Diamond Stone each finished with 10 points in their Terrapin debuts.
Carter led the team in rebounding with eight boards while Stone and Nickens each collected seven rebounds.
The Terps shot nearly 60 percent from the floor and out rebounded the pesky Mountaineers 44-20.
Meanwhile, Maryland held Mt. Saint Mary’s to 31 percent shooting from the floor. The Mountaineers kept the game interesting in the first half as they scored from three-point range, but cooled off in the second half from long distance and finished the game shooting 30 percent from three-point land.
Ashe led Mt. St. Mary’s in scoring with 18 points and also had a team-high seven rebounds. Will Miller added 10 points and Gregory Graves chipped in with nine points in a losing effort for the (0-1) Mountaineers.
