The questions to C.J. Brown kept coming during the Terrapins football team’s training camp. How did the quarterback’s knee feel? Was he 100 percent? Were there any doubts in his mind about his ability after a torn ACL ended his 2012 season before it started?

And in the Terps’ resounding 43-10 victory over Florida International before 36,321 at Byrd Stadium in the season opener, Brown shelved any lingering doubts about both his health and his effectiveness.

Playing for the first time since Nov. 26, 2011, Brown was 20-of-23 for 281 yards and three touchdowns, and the dual-threat passer added 105 yards and two touchdowns on 11 rushes. For the Terps, their fourth straight win in a season opener was their first win since Oct. 13, 2012 and their first win at Byrd Stadium since a week before that.

“It felt great just to go out and do things like I did in the past,” said Brown, who accounted for the most Terps touchdowns in a game since 2003. “Now that I feel a lot more comfortable with the offense, it’s just 10 times better to go out and execute with the offense and put points on the board. It’s always a lot more fun to win.”

Any number of plays could stand alone as the highlight of Brown’s return to the field. It could be his 29-yard run for the Terps’ first touchdown of the season. Or the 25-yard touch pass to wide receiver Deon Long down the sideline to give the Terps a 20-3 lead. Or it could be the sequence in which he scrambled for 64 yards and then hit fullback Kenneth Goins Jr. out of the backfield for a 17-yard touchdown pass. Brown simply gave the Terps a dynamic option at quarterback that they haven’t had in coach Randy Edsall’s tenure.

There were no visible signs of rust, either. Edsall and Brown both said postgame that the quarterback needs to improve his decision-making on many of the read-option plays, in which Brown decides whether to hand off to a running back or keep the ball depending on the defensive line. But when Brown made the right read, it usually ended in a big play.

“Watching him practice all preseason, just seeing how focused he was and how he was executing on the field, I’m just thrilled for the young man,” Edsall said. “I’m just thrilled for him to be able to come back and have this kind of game to open up the season. And the thing is, he’ll be better next week, the week after.”

Brown has a bevy of playmakers at his disposal, too. Long had nine catches for 110 yards and a touchdown in his Terps debut. Wide receiver Stefon Diggs had five catches for 98 yards and a career-long 66-yard touchdown catch, in which he was wide open, caught the ball and stumbled before rolling into the end zone untouched. He finished the day with 194 all-purpose yards.

Early on, the FIU defense keyed on Diggs in pass coverage, which freed up Long on the opposite side. And once the Panthers compensated and started trying to blanket Long, the Terps struck with Diggs.

“Deon is a very explosive receiver on the outside,” Diggs said. “I mean, he can give defenses a lot of problems at the beginning of the game. He opens it up for me, I open it up for him, and we can work together. … All our receivers did a great job.”

While the offense turned in its highest scoring performance since 2010 — the Terps’ 40 first-half points were more than they scored in any game last season, and they scored on the first four possessions of a game for the first time since 2010 — the Terps defense is also starting another season strong. The Terps sacked FIU quarterbacks five times and forced six three-and-outs. The Panthers’ 10 points came after turnovers with a short field ahead of them, and they didn’t record a first down until the second quarter.

Outside linebacker Marcus Whitfield had 1.5 sacks, and inside linebacker L.A. Goree recorded a game-high 10 total tackles. Defensive end Quinton Jefferson had seven tackles, half a sack and 1.5 tackles for loss, and cornerback Dexter McDougle made an acrobatic interception midway through the third quarter.

“I think we were a pretty solid ‘D’ today,” McDougle said. “There’s still some things we need to work on. We know we didn’t play our best game today. We want to keep them out of the end zone in the red zone. We all take pride in the red zone, especially with last year, the stops we had. We want to work on that. We didn’t play our best game, but we played really good.”

Despite the defense’s stifling performance and the electric games of Long and Diggs, Saturday’s win celebrated the return of Brown. After cycling through five quarterbacks in 2012, it appears the Terps have long-term stability at the position.

Brown said he didn’t think a better season debut could have been scripted, and based on Saturday’s performance, it appears there’s still more to come.

“It felt good,” Brown said. “Nerves weren’t too crazy. Most of the nerves were during the pregame meal and the bus ride over. Once I got on the field, everything kind of calmed down when I ran around a bit and broke a sweat. It wasn’t too bad. And once I got that first hit, everything was by the wayside.”