Gophers overpowered by Maryland as men's basketball losing streak reaches 11 games

Maryland isn't the best team in the Big Ten, but it has the conference's best home record, including a win vs. No. 1 Purdue by double figures this season.

That dominance at home by the Terrapins also applies when playing the Gophers. They won by 35 points in Minneapolis earlier in the month, one of the worst home losses in U history.

The Minnesota-Maryland series has been far from competitive going back seven years. That did not change Wednesday night with the Gophers dropping their ninth straight game vs. Maryland and 11th consecutive game this season in an 88-70 loss in front of an announced 14,263 at Xfinity Center.

"It wasn't about offense," Gophers coach Ben Johnson said on the postgame radio show. "We just struggled to defend, especially after those scrappy [first] 10 minutes that we had. They got what they wanted, whether it was at the rim or from three."

The odds that the Gophers (7-19, 1-15 Big Ten) can pick up a second conference win this season in the final stretch are slim if they have repeat performances defensively like Wednesday night.

The Terrapins (19-9, 10-7) shot 68% in the game, the best field-goal shooting for a Minnesota opponent in more than a decade. Maryland trailed early but grabbed control with a 25-4 run in the first half. Julian Reese and Hakim Hart led five players in double figures with 21 and 20 points, respectively.

Freshman Pharrel Payne led the Gophers with 17 points off the bench. In his third game back from injury, Dawson Garcia had 15 points. Freshman Jaden Henley scored 10 of his 14 points in the first half, but an impressive offensive effort for two younger players didn't overshadow how poorly the entire team guarded.

Payne's dunk gave the Gophers their last lead at 19-18. A couple of minutes later, the Terrapins went on a 15-0 run by aggressively attacking the rim with little resistance. Donta Scott, who had 14 of his 18 points in the first half, muscled in a layup with just under two minutes left to give Maryland a 45-24 lead.

"The team we were for the first 10 minutes, we got to bottle that up," Johnson said of the 13-8 lead to start the game. "I truly believe that's who we are. We can't give in. We have to be able to respond."

The 6-11 Garcia didn't play against the Terrapins in his team's abysmal 81-46 Feb. 4 loss, but his inside presence Wednesday didn't make much of a difference protecting the rim. He was also held to just two points in the second half.

Coming off his season-high 31 points in Monday's 78-69 loss at Illinois, Jamison Battle managed only eight points at Maryland, which included going scoreless in the first half. The Terrapins learned their lesson after allowing Battle to explode for his career-high 39 points in College Park last season.

To open the second half Wednesday, Battle scored his first basket with a three-pointer to cut it to a 14-point deficit. But Donald Carey had eight points during a 10-2 run to make it 57-35.

The Terrapins were the second-worst three-point shooting team in the Big Ten entering the night ahead of only the Gophers, but they finished 7-for-13. That outside shooting allowed them to have success close to the basket, going 12-for-19 on layups and scoring 40 points in the paint, including five dunks.

Trailing by 27 points late in the second half, Payne powered his way to an emphatic dunk, but he soon took a seat for good after fouling out.

The Gophers played four freshmen, including Henley, Joshua Ola-Joseph and Braeden Carrington. They never gave up trying to score late but were often lost on defense playing for the first time at Maryland against a veteran squad.

Up next is Nebraska on Saturday, the same team that defeated the Gophers 81-79 in overtime Jan. 7 at the Barn.

The Star Tribune did not send the writer of this article to the game. This was written using a broadcast, interviews and other material.