Maryland Getting It Done, North Carolina Just Done

There is a lesson (or two, or more) to learn from Maryland's 92-71 dismantling of the program that, technically speaking, is the defending NCAA champion.

* Don't bet against the home team when a record-breaking blizzard hits town. As thoroughly as Georgetown handled Villanova the day before in Washington, Maryland handled North Carolina even easier Sunday afternoon -- and anecdotal evidence suggests that the D.C. suburbs, including the College Park area surrounding the on-campus Comcast Center, were in worse shape from the snowstorm than the city was.

* North Carolina resembles last year's national titlists less than it does the rock-bottom teams at the end of the Matt Doherty era.

* Every indication is that the post-championship malaise Maryland's program underwent, the one that got many loudly calling for Gary Williams' job, is over; the Terps are seriously in the Atlantic Coast Conference championship hunt.

* The unconscionable racism displayed at Florida State last week aside, it's not hard to understand why Maryland opponents would want Greivis Vasquez to go away.

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In short: everything is going well for Maryland right now, right when it needs to -- and it's all gone wrong for North Carolina, at this point irreversibly so. The Tar Heels' pedigree almost certainly can't help them now; only winning every game the rest of the way, including the ACC tournament, gives them a chance to get back into the NCAA tournament to defend their crown. The shellacking by Maryland was their 10th loss overall and sixth in the conference with just over half of the schedule to go.

Meanwhile, Maryland, now 16-6 and 6-2 in conference, keeps helping itself by winning the games it's supposed to win. A strong final ACC regular-season record (or, best-case scenario, the regular-season championship) and a deep run in the ACC tournament should get the Terps into the NCAAs even without any significant non-conference wins. Maryland should pass the "eyeball'' test, with respectable performances in its toughest non-conference losses, to Cincinnati, Wisconsin, Villanova and even William and Mary. However, passing the "first-round bye in one of the top three conferences in the country'' test likely will help them more.
The Terps begin the week a half-game behind Duke for first place, even in the loss column; while this overstates the obvious, it doesn't get easier, but it does get convenient this week, with Virginia, a game behind Maryland in the standings, coming to Comcast Center Wednesday and the Terps going to Cameron Indoor Stadium Saturday.

Duke and Maryland, truth be told, are playing recently about as even as their ACC records. Both teams' best players are stepping up, and the supporting cast is -- well, supporting them. In Maryland's case, Vasquez has put together two superlative games when the spotlight, expectations and pressure have been highest. At Florida State, in an atmosphere of fan name-calling and sign-waving that should have left school officials ashamed, Vasquez went for 23 points, seven rebounds and seven assists in a grueling 71-67 win. On Sunday, he jump-started Maryland's domination with three first-half three-pointers, relentlessly pushing the tempo and the
kind of all-court awareness that grates on Maryland supporters when it's not there. He finished with 26 points, six three-pointers, 11 rebounds and five assists.

Everybody else did merely what's been asked of them: Eric Hayes and Landon Milbourne took and make the good shots available to them and combined for 31 points. Freshman center Jordan Williams played an extremely efficient 25 minutes, with eight points, six rebounds and superior inside defense. Dino Gregory (who took a charge in the waning seconds at Florida State to help preserve that win) handled the interior defense when Williams was not in, and chipped in eight points himself. Sean Mosley continued to be one of the toughest, most physical 6-3 guards in the conference, collecting eight points and five boards. Cliff Tucker, used spottily most of the season, drained open jumpers.

Besides positioning the Terps well as the ACC's midpoint approaches, and delighting a crowd driven to a frenzy by a rival and intense cabin fever, the win distanced coach Gary Williams further from the accusations that he'd lost his touch in the years following the 2002 national championship. Suddenly, Maryland appears to have cajoled quality talent that improves over the course of their time there and impresses with their play in tight circumstances late in their careers, more than with their accolades in high school. This group resembles the pre-championship rosters Williams coached, for the first time since the Juan Dixon-Lonny Baxter days.

For North Carolina and anyone who has watched the Heels this season from the beginning -- when they were voted preseason ACC co-champions and were in the national top-10 -- it was another eye-opening experience. Specifically, eyes were open to the fact that, more troubling than their inexperienced, unsteady play, they weren't the most talented group on the floor, once again. At times, it was if they were recording a training film on the benefits of upperclassmen influence and the perils of having none.

Maryland never had to go on an extended run to break the game open; the whole game was a series of short runs that North Carolina could never slow or stop soon enough. The Tar Heels were overmatched on defense and undisciplined on offense, and final individual stats (such as Ed Davis's 16 rebounds) were utterly misleading. A more indicative statistic: Maryland shot 51.5 percent from the floor, including a ridiculous 12 of 23 on threes, for no other reason than that the Terps were able to get them so easily.

Roy Williams' preseason warnings about the extreme youth of his team (in the wake of all the players who left after last year's title) now don't look so much like typical poor-mouthing. No one doubts that this group will get better. But it gets more impossible every day to see how it will improve enough the rest of this season to keep North Carolina out of the NIT. For instance, their next opponent is Duke on Wednesday, and regardless of the game being in Chapel Hill and the blood-rival factor, there's no reason to believe Duke won't take care of the Heels. (Of course, as proof of how this conference makes no sense this season, one of Duke's losses is to one of the only two teams below North Carolina in the standings, North Carolina State.)

Sunday's beating in College Park was just another dose of nasty-tasting medicine for a team that didn't deserve the benefit of the doubt it got when the season began. As the better team, and a team to be reckoned with the rest of the way, it should no longer be a surprise that Maryland was able to serve that dose.