Story By: Erin Zollars
Photos By: Sol Tucker
College Park, MD–
Today was all about celebration in College Park. It’s hard to believe that it was 20 years ago that we watched Brenda Frese take her first NCAA title for Maryland and today they not only celebrated that anniversary, but they bounced back after loss in Illinois with an 82-67 victory fueled by Oluchi Okananwa’s 34 points.
The Terps looked like a much different team today than they did in the game against Illinois. It was if Frese needed a reset for her team to get back to that form that has kept them at #7 in the country for much of the past few weeks as well as kept them undefeated until then.
Okananwa exceeded the highest scoring mark by a Terp this season, and most since Kaylene Smikle’s 36 points against Washington last season. She finished the game shooting 12-of-22 from the field, 3-of-7 from deep and 7-of-9 from the free throw line.
What was most notable was how the Terps controlled the game from start to finish today, something that they had a problem with against Indiana. Indiana was only able to hold a lead for 34 seconds of the game today.
The key turning point for the Terps today was the 12-0 run to open the second half
Freshman forward Maya Makalusky led Indiana with 20 points off 6-for-13 shooting from 3-point range. She was most of the only offensive threat Indiana had in the second half. Without the long-range effort by Makalusky, the Hoosiers could have lost by more than 20 points.
The loss by Indiana today drops them to 0-4 in conference contests, last seen in the 2011-12 season, when they went 1-15 in Big Ten play.
