COLLEGE PARK, Md. – Georgia Tech had scored 19 points in the first half and had amassed a suitcase full of clunker shots.
And yet, the Yellow Jackets had an opening late in the game to steal away from the Comcast Center with a win over Maryland. The end result, however, was a 61-50 loss to the Terrapins Sunday afternoon.
"We felt like that game was ours," said forward Kammeon Holsey, shaking his head. "We gave it up."
The Jackets were trying to build on encouraging results in their first two ACC games, a close loss to Duke last Saturday and a road win against N.C. State Wednesday. Instead, coach Brian Gregory's team groped its way through its worst shooting game of the season and released its hold on the game in the closing minutes with lamentable decision making.
"I thought we played with pretty good effort and pretty good intensity and did a halfway decent job in some stuff," Gregory said. "But on the road, you've got to be better than that and we just weren't [Sunday]."
Tech (8-9 overall, 1-2 ACC) trailed the Terrapins (12-4, 2-1) by as many as 12 points in the second half but reduced the margin to 54-50 on a three-point play by guard Brandon Reed with 3:08 remaining.
However, Maryland guard Sean Mosley pushed the lead to seven by hitting a 3-pointer with the shot clock winding down. Over Tech's next three possessions, guard Mfon Udofia was blocked driving the lane on 7-foot-1 center Alex Len, guard Glen Rice Jr. was blocked trying to draw a shooting foul and then center Daniel Miller, after stealing an entry pass, gave away the possession with an unwise throw-ahead lob to Holsey.
It consumed about a minute of clock and with it Tech's final chance to pull out a game in which it shot a season-low 33.9 percent from the floor for a season-low 50 points. The Terrapins, playing before 11,776, scored the final seven points.
The Jackets had stayed in the game because the Terrapins, in part because of Tech's defensive efforts, had one of its worst shooting games, 33.3 percent from the field. The tug-of-war was the first ACC meeting between two new defensive-minded coaches, Gregory and Maryland's Mark Turgeon.
"I think you saw kind of a preview of what Maryland-Georgia Tech games are going to be like in the future," said Gregory.
Tech's offensive imprecision had a few causes. Len, the Terrapins' Ukrainian freshman, disrupted the Jackets' offense when he wasn't in foul trouble. Tech scored half its 50 points in the 12 minutes that Len was on the bench. Rice, Tech's hottest player with 50 points in the past two games, took eight shots after putting up 27 in the past two. Mosley led all scorers with 18 points, and his defense made it difficult for the ball to find Rice in opportune spots. Rice made two shots and finished with six points.
Said Gregory of Mosley, "I thought Mosley was the toughest kid on the court and he won ‘em the game."
Lastly, the Jackets' shotmaking just wasn't there, as they missed at least 10 shots close to the basket in the first half when they shot 7-for-29 and trailed 24-19 at the half. It was Tech's lowest-scoring half of the season.
"One of the things that we need to preach and need to get better – we need to get tough and be able to finish through some contact and make some plays around the basket," Gregory said.
Said Rice, "We got a lot of good looks, it seemed like, but sometimes they just don't go down." Holsey was perhaps Tech's most effective player, accumulating a team-high 11 points on seven shots. Backup center Nate Hicks tied his career high with seven rebounds. Rice made guard Terrell Stoglin, the ACC's leading scorer, labor for his 14 points with 12 shots.
The Jackets were out-rebounded 38-36, their fifth loss in as many games when they've lost that category.
Said Holsey, "It was a physical game and they out-toughed us [Sunday]."
For a team trying to make toughness its identity, it was an education.
