COLLEGE PARK, Md. — No. 17 Maryland (14-4, 4-3 Big Ten) hits the road for the third time in its last four games as the Terps search for their first victory of the season on an opposing team’s home court when they take on Northwestern (6-11, 1-6) Jan. 21 at Welsh-Ryan Arena.
The Terps have won eight of their last nine meetings against the Wildcats, who are currently last in the Big Ten and have lost seven of their last eight games. But given that the conference’s combined record on the road within league play this year is currently 7-42, Maryland head coach Mark Turgeon and his players know coming away with a victory Tuesday night will be no easy task.
“There are no really bad teams anymore and everyone is so well-coached,” Turgeon said Monday. “It makes it difficult. And then we have the best venues in college basketball. You go places and it’s sold out, especially if you’ve got a number in front of your name you play against a sold-out crowd every night. That’s why you can’t panic.”
Maryland is 0-4 on the road this season with one of those losses coming out of conference to Seton Hall. The Terps are well-aware of their struggles away from College Park and are focused on righting the ship in their next outing.
“You can’t really press about it, but we definitely see it, we definitely notice that we haven’t won on the road yet,” Terps’ senior point guard Anthony Cowan said. “But it’s something that we want to do and something we’ve been working hard for. So hopefully this time around we can turn it around a little bit.”
Northwestern is a young team with a senior backcourt led by guards Pat Spencer and AJ Turner. Injuries to freshman guard Boo Buie and junior guard AJ Gaines have forced the Wildcats to play a big lineup as of late, but Turgeon still expects them to run the sets they’re comfortable with while using the extra size to their advantage.
“They’re going to run their offense the same way, and the (Robbie) Beran kid is having to play the three, which is tough,” Turgeon said. “The last two years they’ve had injuries at point guard and in this league that makes it really difficult. But this (Pat) Spencer kid is going a great job for them. Tough kid, obviously a heck of a lacrosse player and he’s turned into a really good Big Ten point guard too. Chris (Collins) is a good coach. He figures out ways to get shots for them. They played Illinois tough on the road. We give up size some nights, some nights we don’t. It all comes down to toughness and physicality.”
As Turgeon alluded to, Spencer is playing his first season of college basketball after the Davidsonville, Maryland, native transferred from Loyola University (Md.), where he played four seasons of lacrosse at an All-American level.
Spencer leads the Wildcats with 4.0 assists per game while also averaging 10.6 points and 3.4 rebounds. Turgeon admitted Monday that he knew very little of Spencer in high school, but he is turning to the Terps’ video coordinator, Greg Manning Jr., who previously played and coached at Loyola, for some intel.
“They really wanted [Spencer] to stay there and play for their team because people knew how good he was,” Turgeon said. “He’s just a competitive, tough kid, and he never put the [basketball] down and it’s working out great for him.”
Terps’ sophomore forward Jalen ‘Stix’ Smith is coming off of his ninth double-double of the season and is currently one of the most accurate three-point shooters in the Big Ten, knocking down 58 percent of his attempts from beyond the arc in conference play and 40 percent overall on the year.
Besides providing scoring as he has been for Maryland, he’ll be tasked with the role of stopping Northwestern’s duo of 6-foot-10 bigs, Pete Nance and Ryan Young, who are averaging 19.4 points and 13.2 rebounds per game.
Smith’s ability to guard on the perimeter will also be at a premium on Tuesday night in order to neutralize a team that likes to shoot the three.
“We just pretty much have to play shooters [Tuesday],” Smith said. “I know they have a lot of shooters and they have a lot of bigs that can matchup against us. We just have to make sure we stick to our defensive principles on that end of the floor no matter what. Even if they start hitting shots, we just have to make sure we’re focused and locked in and try to win on the defensive end.”
Maryland and Northwestern are scheduled to tip-off from Welsh-Ryan Arena at 7 p.m. EST. The game will be broadcast on the Maryland Sports Radio Network and televised on FS1.
“I’m excited to see the arena,” Turgeon said. “We have good feelings in that building. We’ve won there before. We recruited a couple of their kids, so I know them well. They chose the academic route, so they’re there, but we recruited a couple of kids from their team. We just want to play well on the road. We were playing well for 39 minutes and 45 seconds at Wisconsin. We want to play a full 40 minutes on the road.”
