Bowie's 22 Lead Maryland Past Virginia 66-42
CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. (AP) -- Adrian Bowie and Cliff Tucker could see Virginia sagging defensively against Jordan Williams, daring a different Maryland player beat them.
They were only too happy to oblige.
Bowie scored a season-high 22 points and keyed two critical early runs Thursday night, and Tucker added 13 to lead the Terrapins to a 66-42 victory at Virginia. It was the second-largest victory margin for Maryland in Charlottesville ever. The Terrapins won by 34 back in 1930.
The Terrapins (13-7, 3-3 Atlantic Coast Conference) won despite Williams' off night. He was harassed by 7-foot Assane Sene and double teamed with the ball all night, and had just four points and six rebounds, ending his school-record string of 13 double-doubles.
"A lot of teams probably think if they take Jordan away, that we don't have guys that can step up, but myself as a senior, Adrian as a senior, Dino (Gregory) as a senior, we have to lead this team," Tucker said after making 5 of 9 shots, including a pair of 3-pointers.
"Jordan cannot lead this team by himself. If he's struggling at times, other guys have to pick him up. When they double team him, guys got to hit open shots. We did that today."
Especially after halftime, when Virginia closed to within 26-24, and then Bowie got hot, and the rest of the team followed. The Terrapins shot 68 percent (17 of 25) in the second half.
"The players keep feeding me the ball and I just made shots," said Bowie, who came within a point of his career high. "Today was my day to knock down shots and that's what I did."
Virginia, meantime, looked nothing like the team that hit 10 3-pointers in its last game against Georgia Tech, or the one that has thrived because of long-range success this season.
It was all part of the plan, Tucker said, to limit their 3-point chances.
"They were real frustrated," he said. "That's one of the things that we keyed on."
Virginia (11-9, 2-4) was 4 for 17 from 3-point territory.
Maryland was 7 for 15.
Mustapha Farrakhan and Joe Harris led the Cavaliers with eight points each, but they and pretty much every other player in a white jersey missed at least one shot from in close.
"We had a chance to maybe get into the game in the second half," Virginia coach Tony Bennett said, blaming "too many point blank shots at the rim that we missed."
Virginia shot 33 percent overall (16 of 48) and even missed 7 of 13 free throws.
Sene grabbed a career-best 15 rebounds, but also turned the ball over six times.
Early on, it looked like Sene's play against Williams would keep Virginia in the game.
With Sene repeatedly limiting the Terps to one shot, Virginia led 17-12 after back-to-back 3-pointers by Joe Harris and Jontel Evans, the latter with a defender standing 5 feet away, daring Evans to shoot. The point guard had missed his last 12 shots from the field.
But then the Cavaliers went cold, and Maryland heated up.
Terrell Stoglin scored inside, Bowie hit a 3-pointer from the right corner and, after Sene made a free throw, the Terps scored nine straight, capping a 14-2 run that gave them a 26-18 lead 1:50 before the half.
The Cavaliers scored the last three points of the half to get within three, 26-21, and then the first three after the break to close to 26-24, but Bowie took over. He scored on a drive, hit a 3-pointer from the left wing and then had a steal, layup and bonus free throw.
Gregory's basket made it 35-24, and Virginia never got closer than eight again.
(Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
