Fresh off their highest ranking in the AP poll in over two years, Maryland men’s basketball finds itself as a near-consensus five seed in the updated bracketology, except for one outlet.
Jerry Palm of CBS Sports has been the most bearish on Maryland’s postseason outlook with the Terps still a seven-seed facing tenth-seed Georgia in his latest bracketology. While Palm's draw sets up another potential Round of 32 matchup against Alabama, the team who has ended Maryland's last three NCAA Tournament runs, Palm points to Maryland’s current resume as a concern.
“I do think they need higher quality wins,” Palm said on Vinny & Haynie. “I mean, they need to beat Wisconsin and they won at Illinois, but you know, they've got six Quad One wins. Two of those teams are not in the bracket. One of them barely is – Indiana. Of their losses, Ohio State, Northwestern Washington, not in the bracket. So I think their resume isn't quite as good as it looks. The predictive metrics like them because they win by – they're driven by average scoring margin, primarily, which is a category in which Maryland does well. But the metrics that evaluate resumes have them in the six, seven range. When I'm looking at their resume and comparing them to others, their strength of schedule, especially their non-conference schedule, has dragged them down a bit too because they don't have, not only as many higher quality ways of some of the teams that they're competing with, they have played as many of those games.
While Maryland is 16-1 in Quad Two, Three and Four games this season, Maryland enters the final week of the 2024-25 regular season 6-6 in Quad One games this season with a chance to climb back over .500 when they take on Michigan in Ann Arbor on Wednesday, the final top-20 matchup for head coach Kevin Willard this season. Maryland’s neutral site win vs. Villanova could also shift back into Quad One territory with the Wildcats currently 51st in the NET rankings, While Maryland still has a chance to secure a double-bye in the Big Ten Tournament, contingent on a win on Wednesday night to move to .500 in true road games this season, Palm still noted the Terps’ potential as a team outside of the four-seed line and below who could make noise.
“Maryland is dangerous. I really like Maryland starting five. I'm not – I don’t know how deep they really are, but, they’ve got, I mean, [Derik] Queen [is] terrific. He should be Freshman of the Year in the Big Ten if it's not Jase Richardson. But yeah, that's a guy that you know you can play around and through and he's tremendous and they'll probably go as far as [Queen] can carry them.”
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