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A few days ago, we looked at Pe'Shon Howard's game against Albany as his third-best performance as a Terrapin. Today, we move on to number two.
#2: Maryland 91, LIU Brooklyn 74
November 16, 2012
Ah, November 2012. It seems like just last year. Maryland was undefeated at home, had all the promise in the world with Alex Len and a quickly burgeoning Dez Wells, and even had some solid point guard play in Pe'Shon Howard. LIU Brooklyn was the Terps' third game of the season, and after struggling in the opener against Kentucky, MVPe' had a seven-assist outing against Morehead State.
LIU Brooklyn was one of the few tournaments teams Maryland played last season - they lost in the First Four to James Madison. Led by a trio of Texans (Julian Boyd, Brandon Thompson and Jason Brickman) and two grads from local school Springbrook (Jamal Olasawere and C.J. Garner), the Blackbirds were looking to set their season right after two straight losses to open it up. Then Pe'Shon happened.
Howard, again, was not the leading scorer for the Terps - as far as I can tell, that never happened. That distinction fell to Seth Allen, who scored 19 points and made five of six field goals. Also performing admirably were Alex Len (18 points, seven rebounds, four blocks) and Dez Wells (15 points, eight rebounds, five assists).
But perhaps most impressive was Pe'Shon, who had undoubtedly the best game of his final Terrapin campaign. Seven points, hitting a three-pointer and all four free throw attempts, with a career-high 13 assists (second-highest? eight) and seven rebounds.
Looking back at Pe'Shon's career, I think it's a funny sort of coincidence that one of his best games as a Terrapin was overshadowed by another guard - and the one that will replace him at that. MVPe' certainly had his ups and downs as a Terrapin, but even the ups were outdone by someone else within that game. There was a whole lot of promise for his career, as we'll see with the number one selection, and while he was rarely just bad (I think it would be best if we all forgot about the UNC game), the games when he was truly good were never quite game-defining (in large part due to the blowout nature of most of them). That, of course, excludes the number one selection, which we'll have for you soon.