It’s easy to tell 2014 was a significant year for Terrapins athletics. The university made its switch to the Big Ten, won a women’s lacrosse championship and had the men’s basketball and football teams grab national attention.
So with the calendar year coming to an end, Diamondback Sports took a look back at the key moments for the Terps in 2014.
JANUARY 19: Terps women’s hoops extends winning streak to 14 games
The Terps topped Georgia Tech, 92-81, in a game that didn’t have significant meaning in itself but did provide a sign as to what was ahead for Brenda Frese and her team. The win was the Terps’ 14th straight, marking the team’s longest winning streak of the season and came on a night in which All-American forward Alyssa Thomas recorded 22 points, 14 rebounds, three assists and two steals.
JANUARY 26: Katy Dodds suffers season-ending achilles tear
While warming up for a meet against North Carolina, Terps gymnastics senior captain Katy Dodds tore her achilles and was sidelined for the rest of the season. Dodds was granted a medical redshirt and returns for the upcoming season, but her absence hampered the Terps last season, and they finished short of an East Atlantic Gymnastics League Championship.
FEBRUARY 15: Terps men’s hoops drops heartbreaker in final trip to Duke as ACC opponent
Despite their disappointing start to conference play, the Terps battled back-and-forth with No. 8 Duke in a contest with deep historical significance at Cameron Indoor Stadium. But in a game Blue Devils coach Mike Krzyzewski called “one for the ages,” forward Charles Mitchell had a potential game winning hook shot trickle off the rim to seal another crushing Terps’ loss.
FEBRUARY 22: Terps men’s lacrosse blows out top-ranked Syracuse
The Terps entered 2014 with many questions after graduating a bevy of key contributors in the offseason. But behind Charlie Raffa’s dominance on faceoffs, the Terps beat No. 1 Syracuse, 16-8, in their third game of the season to abolish any lingering concerns about their inexperienced roster.
MARCH 5: Seth Allen, Dez Wells lead Terps hoops to upset of No. 5 Virginia
Finally, the Terps won a close contest — and against a rival in their final ACC regular-season contest, no less. After guards Dez Wells and Seth Allen lifted the Terps past the eventual ACC champion Cavaliers in overtime, the fans poured onto the court to celebrate the team’s only win over a ranked foe all season.
MARCH 7: Alyssa Thomas becomes Terps women’s hoops all-time leading scorer
Thomas, the do-it-all forward, nailed a jumper midway through an ACC tournament loss to North Carolina to break Crystal Langhorne’s school scoring record. By the end of her senior season, Thomas had recorded 2,356 points.
MARCH 13: Florida State bounces Terps men’s hoops from the ACC tournament
One final last-second loss ended the Terps’ disappointing 2013-14 campaign. Coach Mark Turgeon’s team, the eighth seed in the ACC tournament, suffered a 67-65 loss to the No. 9-seed Seminoles in Greensboro, North Carolina, when Boris Bojanovsky flushed home a game-winning dunk. The Terps learned later that week that they weren’t selected for the NCAA tournament or the NIT.
APRIL 1: Terps women’s hoops beats Louisville to earn spot in Final Four
The No. 4-seed Terps’ win over the No. 3-seed Cardinals clinched them a spot in the Final Four for the first time since they won the national title in 2006. The Terps got blown out by Notre Dame in the national semifinal but their deep postseason run generated buzz for the program and cemented Frese’s place among the country’s top coaches.
APRIL 27: Terps women’s lacrosse rolls to ACC tournament title
The Terps beat Syracuse, 13-7, in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts, in the conference title game, and the victory capped three days of dominance. That wouldn’t be the last title Cathy Reese and her squad would take home in 2014, either.
MAY 24: Terps men’s lacrosse falls in national semifinal
The youthful Terps’ roster carried the program to championship weekend for the third time in John Tillman’s four years as coach. But yet again, the Terps fell short of an NCAA title. The Fighting Irish, who also beat the Terps in the ACC tournament, ousted Tillman’s crew again with a thorough 11-6 victory.
MAY 25: Terps women’s lacrosse wins NCAA title
If Terps lacrosse fans felt a sting from the men’s season-ending loss, Reese’s team was there to provide a pick-me-up in the form of the program’s 12th national title. The team’s only senior starter, Beth Glaros, led the way in the 15-12 win over Syracuse with five goals. It was the university’s final championship as a member of the ACC.
JUNE 2: Terps baseball advances to first-ever Super Regional
The Terps baseball team went on a shocking late-season run to qualify for the NCAA tournament and were placed in a region with powerhouse South Carolina. John Szefc’s team didn’t crumple under the pressure, though, and beat the host Gamecocks twice in a row to move into the Super Regional for the first time in program history. The clinching win was a 10-1 thrashing of South Carolina, one of the SEC’s top teams. The Terps fell to Virginia in the Super Regional, coming one win short of the College World Series.
JULY 1: University officially joins Big Ten
After 61 years in the ACC, the Terps officially joined the Big Ten and rung in the occasion with a celebration on campus and in Washington. Selfies were taken, speeches were made and anticipation for the upcoming seasons mounted.
OCTOBER 4: Ohio State topples Terps football in Big Ten home opener
After the Terps won their first Big Ten conference game at Indiana on Sept. 27, the team welcomed Ohio State to College Park for its home conference opener. In Byrd Stadium’s first sell out since 2008, the Buckeyes rolled to a 52-24 victory that dropped coach Randy Edsall’s Terps to 4-2 on the year.
NOVEMBER 1: ‘Let the rivalry begin’
You might remember when the Terps captains refused to shake hands with the Penn State captains after a pregame skirmish. Or maybe you remember when Randy Edsall confidently ended a postgame interview by saying ‘Let the rivalry begin.’ But in between those moments, the Terps earned a memorable 20-19 road win at Beaver Stadium that clinched bowl eligibility.
NOVEMBER 9: Northwestern tops Terps field hockey in Big Ten championship
The Terps field hockey team won the school’s first Big Ten regular-season title, but the Wildcats spoiled the team’s first tournament in its new conference by handing coach Missy Meharg’s bunch a 3-1 loss. The Terps still entered the NCAA tournament as the No. 2 seed, but they lost to Albany to fall short of the semifinals for the first time six years.
NOVEMBER 16: Mael Corboz leads Terps men’s soccer to Big Ten title
Midfielder Mael Corboz’s laser of a free-kick late in the Big Ten title game gave the Terps a 2-1 win over Indiana and a conference championship. The victory also marked the Terps’ 11th straight win and the culmination of a significant turnaround after a shaky start to the season. Coach Sasho Cirovski and his squad, though, fell in the second round of the NCAA tournament to UMBC.
NOVEMBER 21: University unveils plans for $155 million practice facility
The USM finance committee passed the proposal to transform Cole Field House into an indoor football practice facility on Nov. 20, and the university officially unveiled the project the next day. Construction is slated to begin late in 2015.
NOVEMBER 25: Terps men’s basketball top No. 13 Iowa State
The Terps victory over the Cyclones in the CBE Hall of Fame Classic pushed their record to 5-0 and helped the team earn a spot in the AP top 25 the next week. Freshman point guard Melo Trimble won tournament MVP and the team, which hadn’t been ranked since 2010, has improved its spot in the polls each week since the win.
DECEMBER 30: Terps men’s hoops top Michigan State in double overtime
The Terps opened Big Ten play in thrilling fashion, with 50 minutes of seesawing action that ended in 68-63 win. Afterward, Turgeon said, “I’m not sure how we did it, to be honest with you.”
DECEMBER 30: Stanford rolls by Terps football in Foster Farms Bowl
The year of this university’s athletics came to a close with an eventful Tuesday, but nightcap was ugly for the Terps. Stanford dominated Edsall’s team throughout a 45-21 win at Levi’s Stadium.