COLLEGE PARK, MD. — U-M (7-2, 4-2 Big Ten) came in a big favorite, and was able to win by a wide margin, 38-7 over the Maryland Terrapins (3-6, 1-6 Big Ten). Maryland head coach Michael Locksley reacted to the loss.
"Give Michigan credit for the win today," Locksley said postgame. "Coach [Jim] Harbaugh had his team ready to play. I'm disappointed in the score and the outcome of the game, but not with the effort."
U-M jumped out to an early 14-0 lead, and the scoreboard showed U-M looking to be on its way to a rout, but the stats didn't say that, at least in the early going. Maryland out-gained U-M in the first quarter with 53 total yards to the Wolverines' 44. After allowing 325 rushing yards to Minnesota last week, Maryland was stopping the run early in the game, and held U-M to 155 yards on the ground in the game's entirety, under the team's average on the season.
"I thought our defense was a lot better today against the run," Locksley said. "I thought they did a really good job of getting off the field on third down. Obviously, we gave up some explosive plays that I’d like to see us not give up."
U-M freshman wide receiver and kick returner Giles Jackson returned the opening kickoff 97-yards for a touchdown to put U-M up 7-0 in the game's opening seconds. Maryland went three-and-out on its first offensive possession before U-M capitalized on good field position, scoring another touchdown to make it 14-0.
"The area I’m concerned about from this game is the way our special teams played," Locksley said. "We’ve been playing pretty good special teams, and to allow a kick return to open the game, a huge momentum play. I thought we responded the right way in the other phases, but missing field goals, our punting game was very inconsistent today which hasn’t been a huge issue."
Red zone issues stifled the Terrapins as they got down into scoring position twice in the first half, coming up empty both times. Redshirt junior quarterback Josh Jackson threw an interception as he was being hit, resulting in the Wolverines taking over at their own 12-yard line. On the next drive, Terrapins kicker, sophomore Joseph Petrino missed on a 37-yard field goal attempt in the second quarter.
"Early in the game, we wanted to control the tempo, which I thought we did a really good job of on offense. We slowed the game down, we snapped the ball late in the shot clock, but we didn’t come away with points in the red zone.
"We had the interception early in the game and then we missed a field goal. To me, when you do that, and you shorten the game like we tried to do there to keep our defense off the field, we got to execute, especially in the red area, which we didn’t do."
U-M went with a fake punt run on fourth-and-short late in the first half. Locksley was asked if that was a turning point in the game.
"I wouldn’t say it was a turning point, but it did allow them to get some points at the end of the first half that we were trying to avoid," Locksley said of the fake.
In the third quarter, junior running back Javon Leake returned a kickoff for a touchdown to put Maryland on the board. Those would be the only points of the game for the Terrapins.
In the second half, Maryland only drove the ball into U-M territory twice, on its final two possessions, when the game was already in hand. A strong start, in some areas, before a fizzle out and blowout loss could be seen as a microcosm for Maryland's season, where they started out 2-0 before now losing six of their last seven games.
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