COLLEGE PARK, Md. _ With an expected Terps victory Tuesday night, fans were looking forward to a matchup between a pair of Big Ten men's basketball leaders when No. 9 Maryland visited No. 20 Illinois on Friday night.
They got their wish _ barely.
Despite a scoring drought spanning nearly eight minutes in the first half, the Terps joined the Fighting Illini and No. 16 Michigan State atop the conference (pending the Spartan's result Tuesday night against No. 22 Penn State) with a come-from-behind 56-51 victory over Rutgers at Xfinity Center on Tuesday night.
Maryland extended its winning streak to five games and improved to 18-4 overall and 8-3 in the league. The Terps will meet Illinois (16-6, 8-3) on Friday at 8 p.m.
The Terps were buoyed by the play of sophomore forward Jalen Smith, who scored the team's first eight points and added eight rebounds and five blocks in the second half to finish with 14 points, 15 rebounds and six blocks.
Senior point guard Anthony Cowan Jr. led all scorers with 17 points and chipped in four rebounds and three assists. Junior guard Darryl Morsell had 14 points and six rebounds.
Trailing 25-20 at halftime _ the fewest points the Terps have scored in the first 20 minutes since totaling 18 in a 52-48 loss at Seton Hall on Dec. 19 _ they went on a 6-2 mini-run over a 63-second stretch to draw within 27-26 with 16:37 left in the second half. Morsell fueled the surge with a dunk down the middle of the lane and a layup within 25 seconds of each other.
Maryland went on another spurt, this time 8-2. Smith had six points on a 3-pointer and a three-point play to give the team a 34-29 advantage. Shortly afterward, he collected his 10th rebound for his fifth consecutive double-double.
Rutgers narrowed the deficit to two with three straight points, but the Terps went on a 10-4 burst over a 2:43 span _ the final six points provided by Cowan and sophomore guard Aaron Wiggins on back-to-back 3-pointers within 55 seconds of each other.
The Scarlet Knights tied the score at 49, but Maryland converted seven of nine free-throw attempts over the final 2:13 to cement the victory.
The Terps opened the game swiftly thanks to the shooting touch of Smith, who hit back-to-back 3-pointers and collected an offensive rebound for a dunk to give his team an 8-4 lead.
Maryland inflated that advantage to 14-6 courtesy of a pair of 3's from Cowan and Morsell within a 68-second span.
But the rest of the half belonged to Rutgers, which closed out the final 12:51 on a 19-6 burst. Graduate student guard Akwasi Yeboah inflicted the most damage with three 3-pointers over a 2:14 stretch that gave his team a 19-18 lead with 9:03 remaining for its first lead of the game.
Cowan sank a pair of free throws with 1:43 left to end a scoring drought of 7:38 during which the Terps also turned the ball over five times. The Scarlet Knights ended the half in a 5:26 funk of their own, but they still owned a 25-20 lead at the break.
The Terps shot 7 for 29 from the field and 4 for 15 from 3-point range in first half, and went 9:21 without hitting a field goal.
Yeboah paced the Scarlet Knights (16-7, 7-5) with a team-high 13 points and seven rebounds. They were forced to play without junior guard Jacob Young, who had averaged 8.5 points, 2.7 rebounds and 1.8 assists as a valuable contributor off the bench. According to a team spokesman, Young was suspended for violating an unspecified program rule and did not travel with the team.
