Maryland football faces an uphill climb to become bowl eligible after a disappointing home loss to Rutgers.
Maryland fell to Rutgers, 31-17, on Nov. 16, marking the first time in four years the Scarlet Knights have beaten the Terps. Maryland now has to beat Iowa (6-4, 4-3) at home on Nov. 23 and Penn State (9-1, 6-1) in State College on Nov. 30 to earn a trip to a bowl game.
“We’ve got Iowa coming in here with an opportunity again to keep our season alive,” head coach Michael Locksley said. “We didn’t get it done today, and we’re running out of chances and opportunities, and we’ve got to find a way to get this thing fixed.”
Maryland last faced Iowa in 2021, and the Hawkeyes dominated the Terps, 51-14, in College Park. Iowa is riding a three-game win streak against Maryland dating back to 2015 and boasts a 3-1 all-time record against the Terps.
Maryland’s all-time series against Penn State is unbelievably lopsided — 43-7, and not in its favor — but many of those games occurred before the current players were even born. Since entering the Big Ten in 2014, the Terps are 2-10 against the Nittany Lions, which still does not bode well.
Maryland’s loss to Rutgers was another reminder of how this season has gradually gone from bad to worse to just plain predictable, with the same issues derailing the Terps over and over.
Turnovers, missed opportunities and failing to play complementary football held Maryland back yet again against the Scarlet Knights. The Terps missed a field goal, failed convert fourth-down tries on three occasions and couldn’t take advantage of multiple opportunities to score touchdowns. And when Maryland did score, it couldn’t keep Rutgers from responding with a score of its own.
“There were a lot of plays we left out there on the field,” Locksley said. “On offense and defense, we had some explosives that we didn’t hit on early that we need to be able to make.”
“We were able to move the ball but just could not finish drives, and we’re not scoring enough points. We’re leaving some plays on the field,” Locksley added.
Rutgers only punted twice the entire game. The visitors were 6-for-14 on third down and 3-for-3 on fourth.
“We had some opportunities to get off the field. We couldn’t get off the field. It’s been the issue here the last few weeks,” Locksley said.
Maryland, on the other hand, could not put any more points on the board after junior Roman Hemby scored a touchdown for a 17-14 lead with 11:16 remaining in the third quarter. The rest of the Terps’ drives went as follows: punt, interception, turnover on downs, turnover on downs, end of game.
Maryland did have a chance to score in the final seconds of the game but after making it to Rutgers’ 4-yard line the Terps ran the ball with no timeouts and effectively ended the game.
Still, anything can happen in football. Maryland can still become bowl-eligible if it can manage to beat Iowa and Penn State. The Terps, though, will enter its game against the Hawkeyes having lost six of their seven Big Ten games.
“I wouldn’t call it disappointing, but I would say that you know our backs are against the ropes now,” junior linebacker Kellen Wyatt said of having to win out to become bowl eligible. “We need these. We’re taking them week by week. We have one-game seasons, and we’re going to get started for Iowa and do everything we can to win.”
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