After two-straight games in which his team has given up a fourth quarter lead, Maryland coach Mike Locksley is leaving no stone unturned in trying to find an answer to the Terrapins’ poor finishes.
“A lot of reason for frustration for us the last couple of weeks of not being able to finish and get it done … the frustration stems from knowing the kind of team that we have and the type of work that these guys have put in and the buy in that we’ve gotten from each and every one of the players,” he said Tuesday.
Still optimistic about a group he calls “different than any team that I’ve had a chance to coach,” the Terrapins have lost two straight games to open October, primarily due to an inability to “headbutt the finish.”
“We’ve had two weeks in a row where they put their best foot forward for three and a half quarters, three quarters, and they know and understand that it’s important that the finish is just as important as anything we do,” Locksley said.
Inside the weight room at Jones-Hill House, the Terrapins’ practice facility, a large scoreboard at one end of the wall serves as a constant reminder of Maryland’s fourth quarter performance. The red numbers currently display 17-48, after Nebraska shut out the Terrapins 10-0 in the fourth last Saturday in a 34-31 win.
“What we’ve got to do now is figure out how to finish in the fourth quarter … it’s my job to figure that out,” Locksley said. “And I think we’ve gotten to the gist of it.”
The gist has been an attention to detail parsing of the off the field minutiae that make up a Division I football player’s week.
“I challenged our starters — the really good players — about it’s not just me having to adjust to make sure you can get to the fourth quarter,” Locksley said. “It’s about recovery during the week. It’s about your sleep. It’s about your nutrition. Knowing that we have a smaller-size team than we’ve had in the years past, it’s up to all of us to make some adjustments to ensure we’re playing our best when we need to.”
Maryland (4-2, 1-2 Big Ten) hasn’t scored a point in the final frame in nearly a month since a Sept. 20 win at Wisconsin. At that same point in time some 2,700 miles west, conference mate UCLA was reeling from an 0-3 start that led to the firing of second-year coach DeShaun Foster.
Since? The Bruins are 2-1 under interim coach Tim Skipper and winners of two straight after upsetting then-No. 7 Penn State at home and Michigan State on the road, making this Saturday’s game for the Terrapins at the Rose Bowl markedly harder than it was on paper just weeks ago.
“There’s something about the pressure being off of you when you’re an interim head coach … I call it playing with house money,” Locksley said. “I mean, you’ve got zero to lose. You can go out, call flea flickers, you can call double passes, you can onside kick. You can do whatever you need to, because you got nothing to lose.”
The Bruins (2-4, 2-1) aren’t just winning, they’re exerting their will. Under Skipper and new playcaller Jerry Neuheisel — son of legendary UCLA player and coach Rick Neuheisel — the Bruins hung 80 points combined on the Nittany Lions and Spartans. Tennessee transfer quarterback Nico Iamaleava has found his form, tallying eight rushing and passing touchdowns combined in the last two games.
“I think they’ve limited exposing themselves with the negative plays,” Locksley said. “They’re getting the ball out quick in the passing game. They’re relying heavily on the run game and doing a really good job of blocking people up.”
• George Gerbo can be reached at ggerbo@washingtontimes.com.
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