Eighth-seeded Syracuse (12-4, 2-2 Atlantic Coast) was able to pull off the second-half comeback against Albany in the first round of the NCAA tournament on Sunday, outscoring the Great Danes by six in the final 30 minutes. Meanwhile, top-seeded Maryland (15-2, 5-0 Big Ten) continued its dominant run of 14 straight wins by beating Quinnipiac handedly, 13-6.

The Orange and the Terrapins will meet in the quarterfinals at noon on Saturday in Providence, Rhode Island in what Albany head coach Scott Marr called a “Final Four-type” game. Here’s everything you need to know about the matchup.

All-time series: Maryland leads 10-6

Last time they played: The No. 5 Terrapins throttled the No. 2 Orange, 16-8, at the Carrier Dome on Feb. 22, 2014 in Syracuse’s first ACC game in team history and the first regular season matchup between the teams since 1983.

Though Syracuse held a 3-2 lead in the second quarter, Maryland went on a 14-1 run that spanned 20 minutes and 11 seconds and put the game out of hand. The run included a four-goal burst — two of which were on the man-up — by the Terrapins that took just 51 seconds.

Maryland controlled possession, winning 19-of-27 faceoffs, grabbing 36-of-53 ground balls and totaling as many shots on goal as Syracuse had total shots (32).

Current Denver attack Connor Cannizzaro was in his freshman year at Maryland and tied for a team high with three goals and an assist. Nine different Terrapins tallied a point.

All three of Maryland’s top point producers from this season played in the game. Matt Rambo, Colin Heacock and Bryan Cole combined for five points.

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MORE COVERAGE:

• Beat writers discuss how SU beat Albany and the matchup with Maryland
• How Syracuse’s offensive depth paid off against the Great Danes
• Ben Williams and Kevin Donahue adopted the faceoff culture

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Last time they played in the NCAA tournament: Unseeded Maryland knocked off No. 1-seeded Syracuse in the quarterfinals of the 2011 NCAA tournament, 6-5, in overtime at Gillette Stadium in Foxboro, Massachusetts. Terrapins attack Grant Catalino scored with 32 seconds left in overtime to send Maryland into the next round.

The loss ended the Orange senior class’s bid for three national titles in four years.

The game was wrought with controversy as Maryland drew 10 stall warnings and dominated possession. The Orange won just three faceoffs to the Terrapins’ 11. After the game, Syracuse head coach John Desko said that with 9:40 left in the third quarter he looked up at the scoreboard and realized his team hadn’t had the ball yet in the period. The Orange wouldn’t get possession until there were seven minutes and 42 seconds left in the quarter.

The Terrapins also held the ball for the first two minutes of overtime.

“We just had so few opportunities, few possessions that it was frustrating not having the ball more,” Desko said after the game.

“Not once was it talked about. Not once was it said, ‘Stall,’” Tillman said in a pre-Final Four press conference a few days later, according to The Baltimore Sun. “That’s not what we wanted to do, that’s not what we preach. But we also wanted to be smart with the ball.”

The Maryland report: Maryland is the top team in the nation, but hasn’t been blowing teams out of the water all season long. Seven of its 15 wins have come by three goals or fewer.

Led by Rambo, Cole and Heacock, its offense is 18th-best in the country with an average of more than 11 goals per game. Rambo is a small, do-it-all attack that leads the team in points (57) and is second in goals (35) and assists (22). Heacock leads the team with two more goals and Cole leads the team with one more assist. Rambo has compiled 24 points in his last five games.

The Terrapins play largely mistake-free, committing just 10.8 turnovers per game — fourth in the nation. Maryland hasn’t committed more than 10 turnovers in any of its last eight games. With freshman Austin Henningsen winning 63.5 percent of his faceoffs, that means plenty of possessions for the offense. Will Bonaparte spent time at the X while Henningsen was injured and now occasionally subs in.

Maryland has a top six defense that lets in only 7.8 goals per game. More impressive is its man-down defense that is successful 75 percent of the time. Goalie Kyle Bernlohr saves 54.2 percent of the shots he sees.

How Syracuse beats Maryland: Possession. And effective possessions at that. This game is going to come down to possessions — which team has more of them, which team has the last few.

Maryland’s defense is rock solid and has a good faceoff unit to boot. Its best faceoff man in Henningsen seems to be back to full strength after a leg injury kept him out of the starting lineup for four games in the middle of the season.

In the past, Syracuse has had difficulties against Maryland on the draw and it can’t afford faceoff specialist Ben Williams to go winless in the first quarter like he did against Albany.

Beating Maryland starts with Williams and carries over into the offense making the most of its chances. Albany showed how packing it in can stifle the Orange offense for a while.

Syracuse most likely won’t survive if this becomes a low-scoring, defensive battle with the Terps.

 

Daily Orange File Photo

 

Numbers to know:

8.5 – Number of turnovers Maryland has averaged in its last eight games.

15 – The Terrapins’ 15 wins on the season is tied for a program record. A win over Syracuse would set a new record.

4-0 – Maryland head coach John Tillman is 4-0 all-time in quarterfinal games. His first win came in 2011 over Syracuse.

Player to watch: Austin Henningsen

Henningsen is Maryland’s lifeline at the faceoff X. He dominated Quinnipiac in the first round, winning 14-of-17 faceoffs and leading the Terps to an easy win. He’s won more than 70 percent of faceoffs in nearly half of his games this year.

While he was out for four games, Maryland struggled on the draw, including a 5-for-22 regular season-ending performance at Johns Hopkins that still resulted in a win.

Williams will be Henningsen’s first real contest since coming back and their battle at the X should be a major factor in the final result.

Published on May 18, 2016 at 7:04 pm

Contact Jon: jrmettus@syr.edu | @jmettus