Men's basketball team plays small ball

Freshman James Padgett was the lone forward on the floor for the Terrapin men's basketball team when Eric Hayes rose to shoot in the middle of the first half of Tuesday's game against Fairfield.

The 6-foot-4 guard, marked closely by Fairfield's Ryan Olander, lofted a jumper high over the 6-foot-11 forward that swished through the hoop for a five-point lead.

The No. 25 Terps used its four-guard attack sparingly, but that shot — part of a run that included 15 unanswered points — provided a not-so-subtle message the Terps didn't need size to measure up against the Stags.

Despite playing with just three scholarship forwards, due to injuries and Dino Gregory's suspension, the Terps rolled past Fairfield 71-42 at Comcast Center.

"We don't really think about stuff like that," forward Landon Milbourne said of his team's short bench. "We had guys on the bench that were ready to come in and guys on the floor who were ready to play. We got a win, and that's all that matters."

The Terps overcame a sluggish start, including nine first half turnovers, to earn its second straight comfortable win to start the season. The Terps, who got at least six points from each player in its regular eight-man rotation, turned 25 Fairfield turnovers into 21 points, frustrating the MAAC school with their quickness and defensive aggression.

"We're starting to get it in terms of how hard you have to play to be a good defensive team," coach Gary Williams said.

Earlier this week, Williams called Fairfield "a step up" compared to the Charleston Southern team the Terps throttled in the season opener, and the Stags didn't disappoint early on.

They used a variety of different defenses to frustrate the Terp offense. Even though Fairfield (2-1) turned the ball over on five of its first six possessions, the Stags managed to take a 12-7 lead into the game's second media timeout — just more than eight minutes into the game.

But the Terps (2-0) responded with the 15-0 run to take control. The burst included a personal 7-0 binge by Hayes, who paced the team with 14 points for the game, and a nearly eight-minute Fairfield scoring drought.

"I think Eric pretty much fired us up a little bit," Milbourne said. "The way he came in and attacked and hit those shots for us — that kinda got other guys into it."

After the scoring outburst, the Terps seemed to settle, making sure their lack of frontcourt depth wasn't an issue. The Terps wore down the Stags, who started a bigger lineup than usual to try to gain an advantage inside, and rapidly lengthened their eight-point halftime lead.

By the end, it didn't matter that forwards Jin Soo Choi (ankle) and Steve Goins (knee) watched from the end of the bench in street clothes and Gregory was once again absent due to an unspecified violation of team rules. The Terps went to a four-guard set when Milbourne, who added 10 points and eight rebounds, got a breather. But that proved to last less than two minutes in the first half and a few more in the second, after the lead had ballooned to more than 20 points. By the end, even walk-on forward Ersin Levent hit a free throw for his first career point.

"We had a lot of guys that had to play a little different positions at times, but that's OK," Williams said. "We have to adjust to that."

The Terps, who will face their first major conference competition in less than a week at the Maui Invitational, still managed to outrebound Fairfield 41-36 as they passed each test relating to their smaller lineup.

That included Hayes' big-time shot over the outstretched hand of the tallest player on the floor.

"He was a real tall guy," Hayes said with pride. "You've just got to concentrate on the rim when you shoot on a guy like that."

edetweiler@umdbk.com