* Saturday College Report: Air Force Upsets Duke 

COLLEGE PARK, Md. — Yes, Virginia (and Penn State), there is another team that can score some goals.

With the reigning national champions from UVa and the Nike/US Lacrosse preseason No. 1 Nittany Lions getting most of the college lacrosse world’s attention for their ridiculous stockpiles of offensive firepower, Maryland has quietly flown under the radar.

Consider Saturday’s 23-12 victory over High Point the sound of shots fired by the Terps.

Granted, High Point’s defensive pressure and up-tempo approach can lead to a higher-scoring game, but this was hardly a marginal uptick in production from the Terps.

Maryland averaged 36.1 shots per game last season. On Saturday, Maryland had 36 shots in the first half on the way to a 70-shot barrage that ended with Maryland’s highest-scoring output since a 23-6 win over Mount St. Mary’s in 2013.

It shouldn’t be a surprise. Maryland returns its top four scorers from a year ago — Tewaaraton finalist Jared Bernhardt (78 points in 2019), Logan Wisnauskas (79), Anthony DeMaio (46) and Bubba Fairman (42).

Against High Point, Wisnauskas had a career-high six goals, Fairman had a career-high five assists, Bernhardt had four goals and DeMaio had two goals and three straight assists to kick start Maryland in the second half. Combined, the quartet had 13 goals and 10 assists.

“We talked a lot about their offense,” said High Point head coach Jon Torpey. “We talked a lot about Bernhardt. He’s a special player who’s in the mix for player of the year – there’s no doubt about that. But their early offense in the first half, and it bled into the third and fourth quarters, they really took advantage of some opportunities.”

Maryland’s early offense was a direct result of the skill of Maryland’s defenders and defensive midfielders.

“Every year here you kind of look at what you have and stylistically you play to what you have,” said Maryland head coach John Tillman. “We feel like this is a team where we have guys that handle the ball well and there’s been a lot of investment in our defensive personnel. We have good athletes who have experience now.

“We kind of tell the guys, ‘We can adjust the game plan to what we have and you guys becoming more diverse in your skill set and being able to dodge and push and handle allows us to do more.’”
 

High Point is coming off of a season in which it beat both Duke and Virginia, but had to replace star goalie Tim Troutner. Torpey turned to a freshman — Parker Green.

“I was really proud of him,” Torpey said. “If you look at the game and look at the scoreboard you’ll think ‘wow, they really struggled in the cage,’ but a freshman from Memphis, Tennessee made some huge saves for us. I don’t think we gave him the support he needed, but 21 saves is incredible in your first-ever college game. I definitely think he did his job.”

Green made 14 of those saves in the first half when High Point weathered an early Terp run.

Roman Pugliese got Maryland on the board just eight seconds into the game and then freshman Jack Brennan scored twice more in the opening five minutes.

High Point scored twice in the final 3:07 of the first quarter to pull within one, and eventually took a 5-4 lead on Hunter Vines goal early in the second quarter. Late goals in the first half by DeMaio and Wisnauskas gave the Terps a 9-7 lead at the break.

DeMaio pushed the lead to 12-7 with three straight assists to open the third quarter. The third illustrated how in synch Maryland’s offense was on Saturday. With DeMaio seemingly carrying the ball to top the of the box, he instead flipped a pass behind his back to a cutting Wisnauskas, who buried the shot.

Just call him Mr. Behind-the-back

Anthony DeMaio  Logan Wisnauskas #BeTheBest pic.twitter.com/WHYYC7Eynz

— Maryland Lacrosse (@TerpsMLax) February 1, 2020

“A lot of that is communication,” Fairman said. “I thought we did a pretty decent job of moving the ball today. Everyone was on the same page.”

High Point made another run with back-to-back goals by Asher Nolting and freshman Tyler Hendrycks to make it 12-9, but Maryland’s veteran group of Wisnauskas, Bernhardt, DeMaio and Fairman scored the next four goals to ignite a six-goal Terp run that put the game away.

Maryland’s faceoff unit, led by Justin Shockey (15 of 26) was critical to the Terps pulling away. After winning just 7 of 18 in the first half, Maryland turned the tables in the second half, winning 12 of 19.

“At times we were able to get the ball, get a goal, get the ball and get a goal again,” Tillman said. “That got us into a rhythm.”

Once they had the ball, things came easy.

“The offense is more free-flowing and we can move,” Wisnauskas said. “It’s easy to cut whenever you want. Fill and replace. It’s kind of nice to have that freedom.”

Notes: Georgetown transfer Chris Brandau made his debut for the Terps in goal and made 15 saves to earn the win…Maryland sophomore defenseman Brett Makar drew High Point’s All-American Nolting for much of the game and limited him to just one goal, although Nolting did have three assists...Kyle Brickerd, who simulated Nolting for Maryland’s scout team all week, scored the Terps final goal…Hendrycks, a freshman from Canada, led High Point with a hat trick.