Testudo Times - Maryland men's basketball vs. Mount St. Mary's 2015 game updatesSB Nation's award-winning Maryland Terrapins sitehttps://cdn.vox-cdn.com/community_logos/50025/testudo-fav.png2015-11-17T06:30:02-05:00http://www.testudotimes.com/rss/stream/94898932015-11-17T06:30:02-05:002015-11-17T06:30:02-05:00Film review: Stone, Sulaimon give Terps new looks
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<figcaption><a href='testudotimes.com'>Sammi Silber</a></figcaption>
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<p>Some quick notes from a review of Maryland's first game of the season.</p> <p>Maryland plays Georgetown on Tuesday night. Before that happens, we thought it'd be useful to dig in – just a little – to the Terps' season-opening win against Mount St. Mary's last Friday. Here are five plays that could turn out to be precursors to new dimensions to Maryland's offense this year:</p>
<h5>1. Rasheed Sulaimon and Melo Trimble working off each other.</h5>
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<p>This shot doesn't go through the basket, but that's not the point. Much like Dez Wells, Sulaimon is an excellent penetrator. But he's a bit more pass-oriented than Wells ever was at Maryland – sort of similar to Trimble, who loves to drive toward the basket and either draw contact or release the ball. Here, Sulaimon attracts a double team that leaves Trimble open.</p>
<h5>2. Sulaimon and Trimble turning motion into an open 3-pointer for Jake Layman.</h5>
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This is drop-dead gorgeous. Trimble and Sulaimon work off a standard perimeter motion, and Jake Layman just loops around the court, picking up a screen from 6'7 shooting guard Jared Nickens. Mount St. Mary's defenders are clearly confused, and Layman gets an open three. He doesn't miss.</p>
<h5>3. Diamond Stone, savvy with the left hand.</h5>
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It'll be worth watching to see how much Stone relies on his left hand during the season, but this caught my eye. He's not a lefty by trade – at least we don't think – but he goes straight to the southpaw here even though it's taking him into the help defender. Not a worry.</p>
<h5>4. Stone's passing ability sets up a Layman dunk.</h5>
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<p><span>To a degree, this might become less available as the scouting report on Maryland's five-star freshman becomes bigger. But Maryland uses him here to turn an apparent simple handoff to Trimble into a cutting pass to Layman, who has an easy dunk. This caught the Mount by surprise and looked great. We'll see how much it works against power-conference competition that's seen what Stone can do.</span></p>
<h5>5. Trimble creates a wide-open three for Layman, scores anyway.</h5>
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<p>This one shows off Maryland's embarrassment of riches. Teams <i>know </i>Trimble is a dynamic penetrator, and the Mountaineer defenders close in on the rim as soon as Trimble takes the ball from Stone and gets a head of steam. This leaves a nice 3-point shooter in Layman wide open in the corner, but Trimble's good enough – and close enough to the rim – not to even need him. Either way, Maryland's probably scoring points here.</p>
<p>Trimble was shaken up on that play, but he's fine. If their offense keeps humming like this, so are the Terps.</p>
https://www.testudotimes.com/maryland-terrapins-basketball/2015/11/17/9747880/terps-offense-film-highlights-mount-st-marysAlex Kirshner2015-11-14T21:45:16-05:002015-11-14T21:45:16-05:00Scenes from Maryland's win vs. Mount St. Mary's
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<figcaption><a href='Testudotimes.com'>Sammi Silber</a></figcaption>
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<p>See our full gallery from Maryland's season-opening win</p> <p>While setting up my camera to go to work, I didn't know what to expect from this first game. Though Maryland beat SNHU last week, that was nothing compared to the feeling of the game. It was 6:30, and it was freezing cold, but my veins were pumping with adrenaline. This Maryland team had its first season game. The season, which we have all been waiting for, was finally here.</p>
<p>Walking through the player tunnel, I literally almost bumped into the giant team huddle that was happening right in front of me. The boys were laughing, smiling and jumping, and though I was almost escorted out by security, I couldn't help but see their excitement. It matched their fellow students, and they were ready to bring on their biggest game to Mount St. Mary's.</p>
<p>Once Diamond Stone won the jump, everything was moving so fast. Maryland had all of these great chances, highlighted by Jake Layman's screaming dunk. However, the first half was infested with turnovers and field goal by the Mount. I wasn't surprised; it was the first game of the season and the players are going to be a bit shaky and excited to really calm down.</p>
<p>I was incredibly impressed with the performance of Jake Layman. The 6'10" guard was incredibly comfortable out there. Along with his slam dunk, he was the factor that lead Maryland to an 80-56 win. It was Layman's 16 points, along with Trimble's 14, that was the deciding factor in the game. Not only did he bring on the offense, he played excellent defense and was very vocal on the court.</p>
<p>It's exciting to hear them talking amongst each other on the court; you hear things that usually look silent when watching the game on TV or even from the nosebleeds.</p>
<p>Overall, Diamond is brand new to NCAA basketball, and his teammates and coach are helping him adjust in a constructive way that I have never seen before. This is by far the best team I have seen in any sport in years.</p>
<p>If I find more pictures, I will post them on my Twitter page, but for now, enjoy these shots. I'll see you guys after Women's Basketball today.</p>
https://www.testudotimes.com/2015/11/14/9734514/maryland-terps-basketball-photos-season-opener-mount-st-marys-2015Sammi Silber2015-11-14T08:33:41-05:002015-11-14T08:33:41-05:00Layman leads Terps to start his final season
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<p>The senior forward led Maryland with 16 points to began his final season as a Terp.</p> <p>In a very balanced offensive performance from Maryland, Jake Layman led the way with 16 points in an 80-56 victory over Mount St. Mary's Friday night at Xfinity Center.</p>
<p>The 6'9 wing looked as comfortable as ever playing his more natural position – small forward. He has a myriad of teammates to relieve him of his role in the post.</p>
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<p>"Having guys like Diamond [Stone], [Michal Cekovsky] and Damonte [Dodd], who all have improved over the summer on post offense, I've been getting a lot more open shots than I have in the past," Layman said.</p>
<p>It isn't just the improved bigs that help free Layman, its the talented guard play that surrounds him as well.</p>
<p>"Since we have a post presence and a lot of teams are going to key on me, Rasheed [Sulaimon] and Jared [Nickens], I think Jake will get a lot of wide open shots, because we can drive to the rim and kick it out," said preseason Big Ten player of the year Melo Trimble.</p>
<p>His openness was apparent. Layman found room for ten shots, sinking seven of them. His scoring was highlighted by a pair of made threes and two dunks, one off a near-half court alley-oop pass from Jaylen Brantley.</p>
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<p>Layman has developed like few future NBA draft picks have, moving up from a rotation player, to a role player to a starter and now one of the stars of the No. 3 ranked team in the country. But like the team's balanced attack, it doesn't place its leadership needs on one players' shoulders.</p>
<p>"I think me and Robert [Carter] are the leaders on this team, Rasheed [Sulaimon] too because we all have experience," said Layman. "It's good to have that."</p>
<p>The longest tenured Terrapin didn't just lead by scoring, but also with his defense. He had a pair of blocks and steals and was a contributor in holding the Mountaineers to just 31.1 percent shooting from the field.</p>
<p>The Terrapins will look to Layman to help guide the Terrapins to another victory in College Park Tuesday night as the Terps play one of the toughest teams on their non-conference schedule, the Georgetown Hoyas.</p>
https://www.testudotimes.com/2015/11/14/9733892/maryland-terrapins-mount-st-marys-jake-layman-reaction-analysisMatt Ellentuck2015-11-13T22:45:37-05:002015-11-13T22:45:37-05:00After the Buzzer: Terps cruise in opener
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<p>Your three-minute rundown of Maryland's season-opening 80-56 win. </p> <p>In the second installment of After the Buzzer, Alex Kirshner and I discuss Maryland's season-opening win over Mount Saint Mary's in front of a sellout crowd at Xfinity Center.</p>
<p>Coach Mark Turgeon went with a flurry of lineups Friday night, and some worked noticeably better than others. The most unique was pairing point guards Melo Trimble and Jaylen Brantley and centers Damonte Dodd and Michal Cekovsky on the court simultaneously. So a sellout crowd of 17,950 got to see some fun on-court combinations.</p>
<p>Jake Layman also stood out with two highlight-reel worthy dunks for four of his game-high 16 points. He hit 7 of 10 shots including two from 3-point range, and the senior looked comfortable on offense. His offensive game was rounded out by his defense blocking two shots and stealing another pair.</p>
<p>As a team, Maryland shot 58.9 percent from the field on 56 shots.</p>
<p>The Terrapins will try to continue their hot shooting Tuesday night as they take on the Georgetown Hoyas for the first time in seven years before what's expected to be another full house in College Park.</p>
https://www.testudotimes.com/maryland-terrapins-basketball/2015/11/13/9733460/terps-mt-st-marys-basketball-game-recap-videoMatt Ellentuck2015-11-13T22:16:05-05:002015-11-13T22:16:05-05:00Maryland's scoring depth shows through
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<p>In a season-opening win, Maryland's roster stocked the stat sheet.</p> <p>One benefit of having a deep roster full of scoring talent is that when one or two stars struggle, Maryland's offense should be able to avoid totally collapsing. Even better? When everyone clicks, Maryland's offense can absolutely boom.</p>
<p>"Teams have to worry about so many guys that if one guy is hot, they're going to worry about him," forward Jake Layman said after the Terps' 80-55 win on Friday night against Mount St. Mary's. "And then another guy will get hot, so it's going to be nice to have that all year."</p>
<p>Against the Mount, that's what happened. Four of Maryland's five starters reached double figures, plus sixth-man shooting guard Jared Nickens. The only starter who didn't score 10 points, Rasheed Sulaimon, led the team with 5 assists and only bothered with 4 shots from the field, choosing to act as a playmaker.</p>
<p>"It's nice to see," Maryland coach Mark Turgeon said afterward. "Those numbers are nice. I think in the exhibition game, we had five guys in double figures. It means you're a pretty good team if you can do that. If we can average five guys in double figures, then we've got something going well."</p>
<p>Forward Jake Layman had 16 points. Guard Melo Trimble had 14. Forward Robert Carter and center Diamond Stone each had 10, and Nickens had 11 off the bench. Nobody in that group shot worse than 4-of-9 from the field. The Terps were scoring in volume and scoring with efficiency. They totaled 80 points on 56 shots, for a terrific 1.43 points per attempt from the field, running up a gaudy final total despite squandering 14 possessions with sloppy turnovers. It was very much a collaborative effort.</p>
<p>"That's the way it's set up to be," Turgeon said. "We're hard to guard because we've got so many guys that can do things."</p>
<p>Diversity of talent is a major benefit for Maryland. On Friday, a handful of its stars flashed a variety of the abilities that have brought so much hype to College Park this fall. Within a few second-half minutes, 3-point gunner Nickens crashed the rim for a put-back score, forward Damonte Dodd slung a pinpoint interior pass to Michal Cekovsky for a dunk and Sulaimon darted around the court playing every role imaginable.</p>
<p>The Duke transfer – a former five-star recruit who's been regarded as one of college basketball's most talented players for four seasons now – only had 4 shot attempts from the field, <a href="http://www.sports-reference.com/cbb/players/rasheed-sulaimon-1/gamelog/">among the fewest</a> of his career.</p>
<p>"I'm really comfortable," he said. "Honestly, I just want to win. Whatever the team needs me to do to win, whether it's be a facilitator, be a defender, be a scorer, I think I have an all-around game to do that. Whatever the team needs from me that particular game, I want to step up and do that."</p>
<p>Part of the problem Sulaimon poses for Maryland is just an exacerbation of what Trimble already did last year. He's not especially guardable in one-on-one situations, giving Maryland two guards that often require double-teams. Carter and Stone demand the same thing in the frontcourt, and defenses start to leak.</p>
<p>On Friday, no one benefited more than Layman. Against Georgetown on Tuesday, it could be someone else entirely.</p>
<p>"Since we have a post presence, a lot of teams are going to key on me and Rasheed, and even Jared," Trimble said after the game. "I think Jake will get a lot of wide open shots, because we can drive to the rim and also when we throw it down, teams are going to double down, and I think Jake's going to get a lot of wide-open looks."</p>
<p>The Terps come in waves, and it's going to be immensely challenging for NCAA defenses to get in their way.</p>
<p>"The special thing about our team is that we don't look at the first five or the second five," Sulaimon said. "We just have 10 good basketball players."</p>
https://www.testudotimes.com/maryland-terrapins-basketball/2015/11/13/9733280/terps-mount-st-marys-trimble-layman-stone-carter-nickensAlex Kirshner2015-11-13T20:45:56-05:002015-11-13T20:45:56-05:00Watch Jake Layman finish an alley-oop from Jaylen Brantley<h3 class="link-title"><a rel="nofollow" href="https://twitter.com/mellentuck/status/665344476005580800">Watch Jake Layman finish an alley-oop from Jaylen&nbsp;Brantley</a></h3>
<div class="description"><p><p>These two played AAU ball together.</p></p></div>
https://www.testudotimes.com/2015/11/13/9733212/watch-jake-layman-finish-an-alley-oop-from-jaylen-brantleyMatt Ellentuck2015-11-13T20:44:42-05:002015-11-13T20:44:42-05:00So far, so good: Terps beat Mount St. Mary's
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<figcaption>Maryland forward Jake Layman dunks during the first half of Friday's game against Mount St. Mary's. | <a href='testudotimes.com'>Sammi Silber</a></figcaption>
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<p>So far, so good for the Terrapins. </p> <p>The No. 3 Maryland men's basketball team started its highly anticipated 2015-16 season with an 80-56 win against Mount St. Mary's at Xfinity Center on Friday night. The Mountaineers did a commendable job to keep the game competitive into the second half before Maryland pulled away in front of a an announced 17,950-spectator sellout.</p>
<p>As ever, Jake Layman and Melo Trimble paved the way for the Terrapins with 16 and 14 points, respectively, on a combined 13-of-21 shooting. In their official Maryland debuts, fellow starters Rasheed Sulaimon (5 points, 5 assists, 4 rebounds), Diamond Stone (10 points, 7 boards) and Robert Carter (10 and 8) each showed encouraging signs. Five Maryland players reached double figures: Trimble, Layman, Carter, Stone and Jared Nickens.</p>
<p>The victory sets up Maryland at 1-0 ahead of Tuesday's exciting local clash with Georgetown. That game has <a href="http://www.diamondbackonline.com/sports/maryland-georgetown-received-the-most-student-ticket-requests-since/article_01fe3226-8a27-11e5-8f03-3b855b392a9e.html">stirred up a bunch of student enthusiasm</a>, and Xfinity Center should be quite a place to be when the Terps and Hoyas meet up.</p>
<p>Maryland's first half was sloppy. The Terps had a couple of two-to-one leads on the Mountaineers – 22-11 and then 28-14 – but coughed up 8 turnovers and saw the Mountaineers go on a run of hitting 6 of 8 3-pointers as the half near its end. The Terps had a couple of highlight-reel sequences, including <a href="https://t.co/LcM380YVzK">this Layman dunk</a> and a gorgeous transition 3-point setup for Jared Nickens. But they were messy and let the game stay tighter than optimal.</p>
<p>Maryland kept a firm enough grip on things in the second half. The Terps scored 14 of the game's 22 points in the opening eight minutes of the frame, and that was all they needed to avoid any significant danger. A 12-1 run over about six minutes in the middle of the half left the game signed, sealed and delivered to Maryland.</p>
<p>For a second-straight game – if you count last week's exhibition – turnovers were a dark mark. Maryland wound up with 14 against 15 assists, which will at least leave Mark Turgeon with a lot to think about before Tuesday.</p>
<p>Still, Maryland found the win column without any grave danger. That's a perfectly fine way to start.</p>
<h4>Three things to know</h4>
<p><b>1. The aggressive Jake Layman showed up. </b>That's a good sign for Maryland. Layman is one of the Big Ten's best players, but he has a long history of sometimes mixing brilliance with long stretches of quietness. Against the Mount, Layman was assertive all the way through. He took 7 shots in the first half (and made 5) and finished up with 10 field goal attempts and 16 points. Much of the talk about Maryland has centered on its guards and its new set of big men, but Layman's still very much out here.</p>
<p><b>2. Diamond Stone isn't shy. </b>Stone took three shots in the first few moments of Maryland's exhibition game last Friday, and he started this game by backing down 7-foot Mount St. Mary's center Taylor Danaher for two quick post baskets, both on reverse finishes. Not everything fell for Stone on Friday, as he finished just 4 of 9 from the field. But he's got all the tools to be one of Maryland's most memorable big men ever.</p>
<p><b>3. Maryland's guard depth <i>could </i>be a problem. </b>Trimble and Sulaimon are both stars, and Nickens does his 3-point thing exceptionally well. But new backup point guard Jaylen Brantley hasn't looked comfortable just yet, and Dion Wiley's season-ending meniscus injury doesn't leave Maryland with a hugely deep backcourt. For now – and in almost all of non-conference play – this shouldn't be an issue. But if somebody gets hurt, it absolutely won't be good.</p>
https://www.testudotimes.com/maryland-terrapins-basketball/2015/11/13/9732848/maryland-mt-st-marys-basketball-game-2015-final-score-resultsAlex Kirshner2015-11-13T19:35:52-05:002015-11-13T19:35:52-05:00Watch Maryland forward Jake Layman throw down a dunk after a steal<h3 class="link-title"><a rel="nofollow" href="https://twitter.com/mellentuck/status/665325624223907845">Watch Maryland forward Jake Layman throw down a dunk after a&nbsp;steal</a></h3>
<div class="description"><p><p>Jake Layman forces a turnover and finishes the play with a dunk.</p></p></div>
https://www.testudotimes.com/2015/11/13/9732974/watch-maryland-forward-jake-layman-throw-down-a-dunk-after-a-stealMatt Ellentuck