Terps winning with defense as offense continues to come around

COLLEGE PARK, Md. -- The Terps are off to a 4-0 start this season, and while poor shooting has led to three of those wins coming by six points or less, head coach Mark Turgeon’s team still has a flawless record because of gritty defense.

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“We are who we are right now,” Turgeon said Nov. 21. “We’re trying to figure it out. The constant has been our defense. Our defense has been pretty good. We didn’t rebound well [against Towson] and we have to be a little bit more efficient offensively. I have to figure out how to coach them a little better and our offense will come. But I’m proud of what the guys have been able to do. To come back and win these games.”

Although Maryland is shooting just 40 percent as a team this season, the Terps have been able to negate that by holding their opponents to an average of 36 percent from the floor. And while Turgeon’s bunch was outrebounded by Towson 46-33 in College Park Nov. 20, his team still has a +7.8 rebounding margin on the year.

But besides tough defense, the Terps have also been able to survive these deficiencies because of their depth, which should only improve once junior forward Michal Cekovsky returns to the lineup from his foot injury and sophomore forward Ivan Bender’s fractured wrist that he has been playing through fully mends.

“I’m concerned because we’re not a big team,” Turgeon said. “But as Ivan [Bender] gets healthier and [Cekovsky] gets healthier and Dion [Wiley], who’s a big guard, hopefully we become a better rebounding team. But yeah it’s a concern. We’re going to work on it [on Monday]. It’s a concern but I think it’s something that we can correct. Our depth has helped us win. It feels like we’ve been in foul trouble in just about every game so our depth has definitely helped us.”

Despite having an injured wrist, Bender has been doing the dirty work down low for the Terps so far this season. The Bosnia & Herzegovina native is seeing just 12 minutes per game but has made good use of his time, averaging 3.8 points, 4.5 rebounds and 1.3 assists, including a crucial kick out for an open three to help Maryland narrowly defeat Towson.

“We love Ivan,” Turgeon said. “He’s gutting it out right now. He’s still playing with a broken wrist. Hopefully that thing’s not going to be causing him anymore problems in the next week or so. But he really knows how to play. He made a huge assist and he knows how to play. He’s a smart defender--a huge ball-screen defender. He’s just getting used to playing. He missed a couple weeks of practice there but he’s just going to keep getting better and more comfortable and he’ll be a big part of our success.”

While much of Maryland’s offensive woes stem from injuries to the frontcourt, Turgeon knows the Terps’ shooting has also not been up to par yet. However, the leadman in College Park isn’t concerned because he knows he recruited a team that can stroke it and their time will come.

“Shooting comes and goes,” Turgeon said. “I think the key is that we continue to try and take better shots and don’t settle for the first open three. And then we have to establish a little bit more of an inside game, which I think will help our perimeter game, and we have to continue to get to the line. We can get downhill with a lot of guys.”

The charity stripe has been where Maryland has been able to score a lot of its points this season. In fact, the Terps are averaging more than 10 more free throws per game than their opponents and are hitting their foul shots at a 73 percent clip.

But in order for Maryland’s offense to be more explosive, Turgeon knows he has to get dynamic scorers like freshman starter Kevin Huerter involved. Huerter has shown flashes of his silky smooth shot this season and is averaging 6.8 points per game while being tied with Melo Trimble for second on the team in three-pointers made (five).

Huerter averaged more than 21 points as a high school senior and could become a serious scoring threat for Maryland moving forward, but the New York native is second on the Terps in blocks (seven) and seems to focussing more on defense than offense at the moment.

While Turgeon admitted that there could be some merit to Huerter’s offense coming along slowly because of his immense effort on defense, he is not concerned about the first-year forward’s scoring ability and believes he needs to do a better job of getting Huerter better opportunities.

“[Huerter] has had to put a lot in on defense and we have to get him more shots,” Turgeon said. “The good thing is that we’re getting some open looks, we’re just not making them and I’m still trying to figure out exactly how to coach these guys, but I have to get Kevin more shots, get him some more open looks because he can really shoot it and he has guts--he’s not afraid to take shots. But he has put a lot of energy into defense and it’s not an excuse but we have to get him more shots and scoring consistently for us.”