It wasn’t the season they had hoped for. Season sweeps by Duke, Virginia Tech and Boston College. Three straight losses to round out the season. And now Maryland basketball has come to an abrupt halt.
For the first time since 1993, the Terrapins will not appear in a postseason game. And while the young team perhaps didn’t play up to its full potential, it is still a bit of a shock.
A berth in the NCAA tournament would have required an ACC Championship win for the Terps. But an invitation to the NIT seemed like a good possibility. Granted, the Terps were under .500 in the ACC at 7-9, and didn’t hit the 20-win mark.
But then you have to ask why a team like Miami made the NIT field after posting the same regular season record as Maryland, but only going 6-10 in the ACC. Was it their “quality win” over West Virginia or their season sweep of Boston College?
The snub was hard for Coach Gary Williams to put into words.
“I’m shocked…we beat Penn State. We beat Clemson. We beat Florida State,” Williams told the Washington Post, citing three teams that made it into the NCAA tournament. “I guess there are different reasons why you pick teams, other than based on the ability of the team.”
But it may also have something to do with the way the selection process for the NIT works. According to the Post, this season the NIT reserved 14 automatic bids for conference regular season champions who didn’t win their conference tournaments. That left only 18 at-large bids and hurt Maryland’s chances.
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“Unfortunately, that left some teams like Maryland and Mississippi State and Minnesota and some other very good teams that thought they might have a chance to get in our tournament out,” NIT selection committee chair C.M. Newton told the Post. “Frankly, they just didn’t get enough votes to get in.”
But Williams says lobbying by both teams and conferences is affecting the outcomes of bracket breakdowns.
“Teams like Michigan State and Michigan, for that matter, being in [the NCAA tournament] is interesting,” Williams told the Post. “Next year, I think we’re going to be a very good team, and I’m going to talk a lot about how good we’re going to be. The Big East has done that consistently; the Big Ten has done that consistently. The ACC has to do a better job talking about how good its teams are.”
Williams also told the Post he would decline an invitation to the CollegeInsider.com Tournament if it were offered. That’s going to make for a long, disappointing off-season for the Terps.
