At last, won for the road

CLEMSON, S.C. – Sean Mosley turned to his bench last night and let out a powerful fist pump. He screamed at his celebrating teammates inside Littlejohn Coliseum.

In one swift motion, the frustrations of the past few months for the Terrapins men's basketball guard were let out.

The senior guard had been apart of eight straight losses on the road, a mark that began last February and finally ended with a 64-62 win at Clemson.

"Obviously, that's a great win for us because I don't have to listen to them say that we're going after our first road win," coach Mark Turgeon said. "We have that behind us."

Said Mosley: "It feels great. This is taking the next step to becoming a better team."

Mosley scored 16 points and became the 50th player in program history to pass the 1,000-point mark in a career.

He also gave the host Tigers (11-12, 3-6 ACC) one final chance when he missed the second of two free throws with 1.3 seconds left and the score at 64-62.

On the following inbounds play, Mosley made a break on a full-court pass by Tigers forward Milton Jennings, but stepped out of bounds as he grabbed the ball. Since the ball never entered play, the Tigers were ordered back to the baseline, and guard Andre Young couldn't hit the last-second heave.

"We got real lucky," Turgeon said of the late play. "You just kind of had a feeling it was going to come down to that."

The Terps (14-9, 4-5) held a four-point halftime lead and used an efficient offensive attack to start the second half. Mosley and guard Pe'Shon Howard hit a combined three consecutive 3-pointers, putting the Terps up 46-32 with 12:56 left in the game.

Those two, however, were among the least of the troubles last night for Clemson, which had no answer for guard Terrell Stoglin. The sophomore finished with a game-high 27 points on 11 shots, hitting four of his six 3-point attempts. His shooting performance — a near-perpetual source of intrigue and controversy this season — hardly overshadowed a balanced night from his Terps teammates.

"One of the keys to winning the game was valuing every possession," Mosley said. "I think all the guys shared the basketball the whole game. We took shots that we knew we could make. That helped us get the win tonight."

With seven minutes left in the game, the Tigers started a run of their own, propelled by a 3-pointer from Young out of a media timeout. Clemson ran off eight straight points as part of a 13-3 run to cut the lead to four.

Against a high-pressure 1-3-1 defense that stretched past the 3-point line to the top of the key, the Terps struggled to get into their offense and committed a series of turnovers. Then Stoglin found an opening and hit a 3-pointer with 4:39 remaining to put the Terps up 56-47.

With a 61-58 lead and less than a minute left, the Terps had a chance to seal the win, but center Alex Len and guard Nick Faust both missed shots inside that led to a fastbreak by Young. The guard pump-faked from the 3-point line and drew a foul on Howard with 10.7 seconds left.

The ACC leader in free-throw percentage, though, missed his first two before hitting his last attempt. Stoglin hit two subsequent free throws, followed by a Jennings 3-pointer with 2.8 seconds left and then a Mosley free throw to put the Terps up 64-62.

The Tigers weren't able to convert their last-second, potentially game-winning 3-pointer as the Terps — finally — walked out winners.

"It was our next step," Turgeon said. "You can just see we're growing up. Guys are caring more. You like being around each other more today than six weeks ago. By no stretch of imagination are we a great team. But we're playing as well as we can be playing at this point."

More than anything, players said, the win was a relief.

"We were hearing it from our coach, that we had to get road wins, that he's tired of hearing that we cannot win on the road," Stoglin said. "So this is a big-time win."

For the first time in a while, the Terps last night left a building not named Comcast Center full of laughs.

Smiling as he walked out, Turgeon said: "I can finally sleep tonight."

ceckard@umdbk.com