NCAA Basketball: Ohio State’s defense, Virginia’s limitations and more weekly takeaways

2) Maryland is a legitimate top-five team

Remember the concerns I had about Maryland last week? The Terps have eliminated those concerns for me in just one week’s time thanks to blowout wins over Marquette and Notre Dame, and then a comeback victory over Illinois in their Big Ten opener.

Marquette was the best team Maryland had played in the finals of the Orlando Invitational, and they were facing them at worst time as Markus Howard was coming off back-to-back 40-point and 51-point performances. Instead of folding, the Terps played their best game of the season. They built a 20-point lead in the first half and held Howard to a season-low six points on just 1-12 shooting.

That was a tremendous display of their defense and potential, and they avoided a letdown game in their following outing against the Fighting Irish.

They closed the week against Illinois and it looked like this was finally going to be the game where the Terps slipped up. The Fighting Illini built a double-digit lead in the first half and maintained a sizable lead throughout most of the second half. These are the kind of games that Maryland has routinely lost under head coach Mark Turgeon due to poor late-game execution, playcalling, or lackluster defense.

Instead, this Maryland team rose to the challenge. They ripped off an 11-1 run to close the game as Anthony Cowan Jr. and Jalen Smith made several big plays down the stretch, and they kept Illinois without a basket for the final five minutes. As a result, they pulled out a one-point victory.

There’s no doubting the talent on this Maryland team, but coaching, a lack of mental toughness, and a lack of cohesion had kept previous talented Terrapin teams from reaching their full potential. This team appears to have everything for them (a big testament to Cowan’s leadership) and, if Turgeon continues to draw up plays as he did late in this one, Maryland will be a top-five team throughout most of the season.