Maryland vs Indiana: 3 most important matchups

The Maryland football team wraps up its home slate against Indiana on Saturday at noon. The Terps are narrow favorites despite losing seven games in a row and falling to 2-8 on the season, and this is probably their last best chance to not wind up 2-10 this season. It'd be nice for Maryland to get at least one win for interim head coach Mike Locksley, and for all of the program's seniors playing their last games at Byrd Stadium.

If that's going to happen, these three matchups will have to swing in Maryland's favor:

#1. Yannick Ngakoue vs Jason Spriggs

Yannick Ngakoue has been a monster this season and has gotten to the quarterback 12.5 times. He could break the single season school record with just one sack. He'll probably spend a bunch of snaps against an accomplished left tackle in Jason Spriggs, who received an All Big-Ten  honorable mention by the media in 2014 and allowed only 2 sacks in 689 snaps that season as well. This should be a great matchup between two leaders of their respective units.

#2. Perry Hills vs Indiana's secondary

Perry Hills has been an interception machine. There's no other way to put it. However, the fact that he has the ability to use his legs has helped Maryland get out of some bad situations. Indiana's secondary has only picked off the ball seven times this season which is second to last in the Big Ten. Hills needs to take care of the ball and make sound decisions if Maryland is going to win on his shoulders.

#3. The Maryland seniors against time.

For some of the seniors, this will be the last game they play in Byrd Stadium and they'll probably move on from football, go off and do other things. For the others, they're going to try their hand at the NFL, so this game will be extra film on their highlight packages. Against Indiana, all three units have to come together as one cohesive unit, or Maryland is ticketed for 2-9. It starts with the seniors, just like it will end with them.