An entire game could have been played in the final minute of Friday’s back-and-forth match between No. 7 Maryland and No. 16 Ohio State.
Holding a one-point lead with 11 seconds left, Abby Meyers made one of her two free-throw attempts to double the Terps’ advantage. The Buckeyes then advanced the ball with a timeout before Shyanne Sellers picked up her fifth and final foul on Rikki Harris.
Harris went to the line with a chance to tie the game but missed both her looks from the charity stripe.
The Buckeyes grabbed the rebound to maintain possession but couldn’t score on the missed shot. With the seconds ticking down, Taylor Thierry put up a contested jumper, which hit the rim and bounced out. However, Cotie McMahon was there to put the rebound in the net.
The only problem: the clock hit zero before she could release her shot. Maryland (24-5, 15-3 Big Ten) won, 76-74, at The Schottenstein Center.
“It felt like a game that you would see in the postseason here in March,” Maryland coach Brenda Frese said. “Just the mentality of being able to make one more play.”
Should No. 6 Iowa lose to No. 2 Indiana on Sunday, Maryland would earn the No. 2 seed in the Big Ten tournament after defeating Ohio State (23-6, 12-6).
The Terps again relied on stellar bench play from Brinae Alexander and Lavender Briggs. Alexander picked up where she left off against Iowa — the Vanderbilt transfer went 6-for-9 from three on Tuesday en route to a season-high 24 points — by making her first three attempts from behind the arc.
Alexander was tied for second on the team with 16 points, providing offensive depth off the bench.
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“I’ve enjoyed my role this year and coming off the bench,” Alexander said. “I just feel good about how the game is being played, and I’ve just been feeling good when I get on the court.”
Briggs, who finished with eight points, again was tasked with guarding the opposition’s top player; on Tuesday, Briggs held Caitlin Clark in check. On Friday, she frustrated Taylor Mikesell, who spent two seasons with the Terps.
But even with Briggs putting in a defensive shift, Mikesell, who scored just 12 points on 5-for-19 shooting from the field in the first meeting between the two sides, finished with 18 points. She was instrumental in helping Ohio State outscore Maryland 30-20 in the third quarter.
“Again, to go back-to-back games between Caitlin Clark and now [Taylor Mikesell], it requires a lot,” Frese said of Briggs. “And then I felt like her timely threes were huge for the offense.”
In between the third and fourth quarters, Frese was shown on the television broadcast laying into Sellers, saying, “we need you to show up!” and challenging her second-leading scorer to pick up her defensive play.
Sellers, last year’s Big Ten sixth player of the year, had just two points and had missed all four of her shot attempts through three quarters. The guard recorded her first two makes of the game in the final 10 minutes but finished with seven points on 2-for-9 shooting and four assists and fouled out in the final seconds.
While Maryland’s leading scorer, Diamond Miller, had 16 points and seven rebounds, Frese said after the game that the team could have gotten a lot more out of the senior standout. Going into the fourth quarter, Miller had just one foul. But she picked up three personals in the fourth, sending her to the bench, where she remained for over three minutes before re-entering the contest.
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With Sellers and Miller having quiet games, Meyers lifted the offense; she finished with a game-high 24 points on efficient 11-for-15 shooting from the field while playing all but two minutes. To kick off the fourth quarter, the Princeton transfer nailed a three-point jumper before making a fast-break layup. Her five points in 30 seconds prompted an Ohio State timeout.
“For me, it’s just doing as much as I can to help this team in the simplest way,” Meyers said. “Getting those [offensive rebounds], getting those steals when I can, playing good defense, knocking down open shots.”
She then hit a layup with 2:45 remaining, breaking a 73-73 tie. The basket was the deciding score and the last field goal of the game as the Terps finished their regular-season slate with their sixth consecutive win. They finished with an 11-2 record on the road.
“I thought Abby was just fearless,” Frese said. “I thought it was huge just her even stepping up and making that last free throw, it mattered and just staying with it.”
Four different Buckeyes scored in double digits despite them being without one of their top players in senior Jacy Sheldon, who has struggled this season to stay healthy. McMahon had 20, Thierry added 16 and Rebeka Mikulasikova logged 13. But despite decent outings from the quartet, Ohio State made just 40 percent of its free throws, missing 12 of 20 tries.
While Maryland defeated then-No. 10 Ohio State by 36 points in early February, its largest win against a top-10 opponent in program history, Friday provided a sneak peek into the intensity of tournament play.
