Terps lose Big Ten home opener; Quick Hits

Hosting a Big Ten conference game for the first time; the University of Maryland was crushed by the Ohio State Buckeyes 52-24. With the loss, MD falls to 4-2 overall, 1-1 in Big Ten play.

Effectively the game was competitively over after OSU scored on their opening drive, running the ball down the throats of the Terrapins.

Last week at Indiana showed MD was ready to play with the middle and bottom-tier of their new league. Today reminds that the Terps are not ready to compete against the best.

The remaining schedule for Maryland is Iowa, @Wisconsin, @Penn State, Michigan State, @Michigan, and Rutgers. The game vs. Iowa is in two weeks, after a bye this coming Saturday. That is a game this MD program needs to be a win. The result today eliminates any real hope of stealing a game vs. the Badgers, or against the Spartans. The games at Penn State, and at Michigan are games where the Terps will not be favored, but should have a chance. Rutgers at home is another game that the Terps will need to win. However, it should be noted that Rutgers is showing some promise; and that will basically be a pick’em type of game.

The home loss to West Virginia continues to hurt.

(Discuss this on the BSL Board here.)

Quick Hits:

– Let’s start with the lone true positive. Byrd Stadium was sold out today, and even though Ohio State’s fans were a very large part of that; it was a bigger time atmosphere regardless. There were a lot of quality HS prospects at the game. While the result itself was poor for Maryland, those players had the chance to envision what could be.

– The first half ended with MD trailing 31-10. Maryland had pulled within 14 points, and had the ball at their 7 yard line with 72 seconds left in the half. Facing the wind, MD elected to try and get points. CJ Brown did the one thing he could not do – get picked off – and OSU would promptly score to push their lead out to three TD’s.

– To begin the 2nd half, MD elected to replace CJ Brown with Caleb Rowe.  ABC/ESPN’s Todd McShay (doing sideline work today) reported it was a coaching decision. That MD had not liked some of what they had saw in the first half from Brown, and that Brown had not practiced effectively during the week. If that is accurate, why did he start?

– MD has plenty of skill position talent. When they play high-quality programs, what you see is the limitations in the trenches.

– The Terps lone scoring drive of the 1st half came when Brown started to make quicker decisions, and get the ball in the hands of his play-makers. Why did it take until the fifth series of the game for these adjustments?

– The Maryland offense was limited to 103 yards in the 1st half.

– Ohio State put up 289 yards of production in the 1st half, 138 on the ground. The Buckeyes were 5 of 8 on 3rd down in the first two quarters. For the game, OSU had 532 yards; and were 8 of 14 on 3rd down.

– The Buckeyes got to Brown for four sacks in the 1st half.

– Rowe’s arm strength again showed in his second drive. The Terps moved down the field on a series of passes, with Rowe connecting with Leak on a 50/50 ball along the sideline. The drive ended with Rowe being picked off in the end zone – on a ball it appeared that Leak gave up on.

– Rowe finished the day 13 of 21, for 173 yards, 1 TD, and 3 picks. His last pick was completely on him. The first two you could argue were on Leak.

– Craddock had a 57 yard field goal. That was impressive.

– Veii had a 60 yard reception.

– Cudjoe-Virgil, and Monroe had a few moments.

– The Maryland secondary was picked on. That was partly on them (Sean Davis in-particular had a tough day in coverage), but also partly on the Front 7 not getting enough pressure.