Maryland Beats Charlotte at Home to be 2-0
Things could not have started any worse for Maryland in their game against the visiting Charlotte 49ers. Maryland had won the toss and elected to defer giving the 49ers the ball to start the game. On their fifth play of the drive, Jalon Jones hit Jairus Mack for a 48 yard pass for a touchdown thanks to a breakdown in the Terps secondary that got Mack wide open with no one within 15 yards of him. After a muffed kickoff return by Maryland, on their first offensive play of the game, Taulia Tagovailoa threw a quick out that would wind up getting picked off by Demetrius Knight II, who would return it for a 16 yard touchdown. However, this would be the last time the 49ers would score until late in the fourth quarter.
For the rest of the first quarter. Both defenses were doing their jobs and shutting down the offense’s. It was not until there was 11:09 left in the second quarter that Maryland would finally get their first points off the day. They would get into the redzone however the drive would stall out and Jack Howes would make a 32 yard field goal. Maryland’s next two possessions would end up the same way. They would reach the redzone but the drives would wind up stalling out and they would need to kick a field goal. Howes would make both field goals from 38 and 45 yards to cut the 49ers lead to five at the half making it 14-9.
Maryland would start the second half with the ball and would wind up scoring a touchdown off a one yard quarterback sneak by backup quarterback Billy Edwards. With Maryland looking to go up by three, they would go for two and Tagovailoa would complete a pass to Tai Felton to make it 17-14. Once Maryland took the lead, they would never look back. The defense kept doing their jobs and forcing the 49ers to punt or cause them to turn the ball over on downs. Neither team would score again in the third quarter keeping it a close three point lead for Maryland heading into the final 15 minutes.
The Maryland offense would get the fourth quarter started off with a bang. The first play of the quarter, Colby McDonald would take a handoff from Tagovailoa and he would run for a 23 yard touchdown to now make it 24-14. After forcing yet another stop on defense, Maryland would put together another scoring drive, this time however ending in a 40 yard passing touchdown from Tagovailoa to Kaden Prather. The Maryland offense was finally finding themselves in a groove and would score once more thanks to a 15 yard run from Roman Hemby making it 38-14. After Hemby’s rushing touchdown, head coach Mike Locksley would start to give some backups playing time and give the starters the rest of the game off. Charlotte would take advantage and would drive down to the Maryland one yard line where Joachim Bangda would run it in to make it a 38-20 game. Charlotte would then go for two however Maryland’s defense would get stop them with an incomplete pass. Maryland would get the ball back and simply run out the clock to end the game at 38-20 and head into week three 2-0 where they will face former ACC rivals in the Virginia Cavaliers.
This week’s players of the game are Roman Hemby and Jaishawn Barham. Hemby went on to show Maryland fans that last season was not a fluke and he is a star player finishing the game with 217 total yards of offense as well as a rushing touchdown on the day helping the Terps offense find its groove in the second half leading to the win. Barham led the Maryland defense in sacks and tackles for loss with two, as well as solo tackles with four. Barham would come up key twice with both sacks coming on a third and fourth down helping give the ball back to the Maryland offense.
The Terps are set to face Virginia in a Friday night clash at 7PM EST that will be airing on FS1. The theme of the game is a blackout as Maryland will be wearing their new black Terps script uniforms.
