Forward Alyssa Thomas drives against Connecticut guard Kelly Faris on Dec. 3.
After a season featuring an early upset, a flurry of torn ACLs and a rigorous ACC schedule, the Terrapins women’s basketball team finally knows how its quest for the program’s second national championship will begin.
The No. 4-seed Terps will begin the NCAA Tournament against No. 13-seed Quinnipiac on Saturday at Comcast Center. It’s the second time in the past three years the Terps have earned the No. 4 seed.
Quinnipiac earned its first-ever NCAA Tournament berth with a 72-33 victory over St. Francis on Sunday in the NEC title game. The Bobcats finished the season 30-2 and are led by senior guard Felicia Barron, who averaged 13.4 points per game this season, and sophomore guard Jasmine Martin, who posted 13.1 points per game.
Quinnipiac enters the tournament on a 22-game winning streak. The Bobcats haven’t lost since falling to Georgia Tech on Dec. 29. The Bobcats and Terps have three common opponents, and Quinnipiac fell to Hartford and Georgia Tech — who the Terps beat — and beat Mount St. Mary’s twice, which the Terps beat in November.
The Terps are in the Bridgeport, Conn., region, which features No. 1-seed Connecticut, No. 2-seed Kentucky and No. 3-seed North Carolina ahead of the Terps. In all, the Terps played six games against teams in their region — UConn, North Carolina (three times), No. 6-seed Delaware and No. 9-seed St. Joseph’s — and posted a 2-4 record.
If the Terps defeat Quinnipiac, they will face the winner of No. 5-seed Michigan State and No. 12-seed Marist on Monday night. The Spartans were in College Park last season as a No. 10-seed and fell in the first round.
In the Terps’ half of the region, a rematch with UConn in the Sweet 16 could await, while North Carolina and Delaware are in the bottom half of the bracket. The only way the Terps could face them again is if they advance to the Elite Eight.
Saturday’s matchup will be the Terps’ first in exactly two weeks. In their last game in the ACC Tournament on March 9, the Terps were overwhelmed by North Carolina, which mounted a comeback from a 14-point halftime deficit with fresh legs.
But with a long layoff between games, the Terps aren’t expecting any ill effects of the loss to carry over to the tournament.
“Sometimes when you don’t have time to recover with practices, you kind of layer in your deficiencies, so you’re not allowed to get better,” Frese said. “Just having these two days back with film and practice, you can already see our transition game back to where it needs to be. You can already see our communication back on the defensive end.”
Entering the NCAA Tournament, the Terps won’t find themselves in a situation like they were in Greensboro, N.C., again. In the pursuit of the ACC title, the Terps were charged with winning three games in three days. They were pushed to overtime in the quarterfinals against Wake Forest before falling to North Carolina less than 24 hours later in the semifinals.
With the scheduling for the national tournament, the Terps are slated for two games in three days. It’s a completely different challenge, one that the Terps will have the benefit of staying at home for during the first weekend.
“ACC back-to-back with such short numbers is so hard to do,” Thomas said. “Definitely took a toll on us. With NCAAs, we definitely have that rest and we’ll definitely be able to play up to our best.”
Now, the stage is set for the Terps to begin its attempt at returning to the Elite Eight — and potentially advancing beyond. For a team boasting two of the ACC’s top players and a host of vital contributors, the two weeks between games is just what the team needed.
When Saturday comes, the Terps will be ready.
“We’ve gone through this every year, so we’ve got kind of a good equation of how we do things,” Frese said. “It’s good because you get back to practices and fine tune what you need to get better at, but also get rest and kind of just clear from everything. It’s a nice time to be able to take a breath before you get back to the intensity of it all.”
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