NCAAW: Maryland Terps benefited from Smikle, Te-Biasu, switch military

The switch portal is messing with the feelings of ladies’s faculty basketball followers.

However for followers of the Maryland Terrapins, who had skilled the heartbreak of seeing so many proficient gamers go away in recent times, it messed with our feelings in a great way in 2024-25.

Previous to this season, we suffered the whiplash of seeing a bunch of key contributors star in pink, black and gold. Shakira Austin. Taylor Mikesell. Ashley Owsu. And, most of all, Angel Resse. However for under a short time. So it messed with us. That’s to not say the switch portal hasn’t been bringing us pleasure from the leap. Who might neglect Abby Meyers, Katie Benzan, Jakia Brown-Turner, Chloe Bibby, Brinae Alexander, Mimi Collins, Lavender Briggs and Elisa Pinzan?

However this was a yr to really get up and cheer for the switch portal if you happen to root for the turtles. Head coach Brenda Frese’s squad was nearly fully made up of transfers. Of eight rotation gamers, solely senior Shyanne Sellers and junior Bri McDaniel began their faculty careers in Faculty Park. You had newcomers Kaylene Smikle, Sarah Te-Biasu, Saylor Poffenbarger and Christina Dalce, in addition to second-year Terp Allie Kubek, all making big contributions. Beginner Mir McLean additionally chipped in for a group that acquired off to the fourth-best begin in program historical past (14-0) and rapidly made a leap from No. 18 to No. 11 within the AP High 25 ballot after the primary week of the 2024-25 season earlier than peaking at No. 7 throughout their undefeated stretch.

The group would go on to be hindered by a season-ending ACL tear suffered by McDaniel, arguably the group’s third-best participant, in addition to accidents to arguable-best-player Sellers and key 3-point risk and rebounder Poffenbarger that brought about these two to not be 100% down the stretch, in the end leading to a Candy 16 exit by the hands of defending champion and No. 1-seed South Carolina.

It was a disappointing end. The Terps got here inside 4 factors of the mighty Gamecocks regardless of their harm woes, and had they received, they might have felt like they might have received the entire event.

Endings are all the time disappointing except your group wins all of it. Yearly has been disappointing as a Terp fan since 2006. 2023—making the Elite Eight!—was a bit much less disappointing. However Maryland beat an Olivia Miles-less Notre Dame group within the Candy Sixteen to get there. It felt a bit fortunate. Properly, this yr, the Terps had been unfortunate as a result of McDaniel would have made up that four-point distinction, that means we might have been making a hard-earned Elite Eight journey and will have gone even additional.

I felt just like the Terps had championship potential ever since a five-point loss to USC on Jan. 8. If we make smarter performs down the stretch of that recreation towards the then-No. 4 Trojans, we supply momentum over, beat Wisconsin and Minnesota extra soundly in our subsequent two contests and perhaps don’t drop the entire three video games after that towards No. 7 Texas, No. 12 Ohio State and No. 1 UCLA. After all, the start of that three-game dropping streak additionally coincided with the start of McDaniel’s absence. With a win over USC, we might have maintained a confidence that will have prevented our eventual losses to lesser groups. With that confidence and with McDaniel wholesome, I believe we stay in that high 11 all season lengthy—and perhaps even be a part of the massive six of UCLA, South Carolina, Texas, USC, UConn and Notre Dame, turning into a seventh group that the media considers to be a tier above the remainder of the nation.

That’s a part of the story of this season for the Terps: We had been higher than what our Candy 16 end signifies, and it’s arduous to let that go. Nonetheless, the opposite a part of the story is that unbelievable 14-0 begin—led principally by transfers—and the unbelievable means we responded to McDaniel’s harm, with Te-Biasu capturing vengeance over Ohio State with an time beyond regulation, game-winning 3 to shut the common season, adopted by her and fellow transfers Smikle, Kubek and McLean (DEFENSE!) developing clutch once more in a double-overtime basic towards No. 5 seed Alabama that allowed us to at the very least get to our fourth Candy 16 in 5 years and twelfth beneath Frese. McDaniel was, in fact, additionally big within the time that she performed, and what a senior season it was for Sellers, who I believe was actually Maryland’s greatest participant regardless of Smikle being our main scorer.

However the true story is how 15 younger girls, together with 9 transfers, got here collectively—most taking part in with one another for the primary time—and fashioned a chemistry that will have put them in place to compete for a championship had accidents not gotten in the way in which.

Maryland followers have misplaced Austin, Mikesell, Owusu and Reese to the switch portal. Within the case of Austin, Mikesell and Reese, all of them grew to become larger stars away from Faculty Park, which was robust to observe. One second you’re feeling a connection to them as a result of they play to your college, and also you root for them like loopy; the following you’re confused about the way to really feel about them as they don a distinct jersey. Going additional again, you would additionally level to Lexie Brown and Natasha Cloud, who each turned out to be WNBA gamers like Austin and Reese. I do know what it was wish to go to Maryland similtaneously these two, root for them after which see them go away.

However I’ve additionally seen the opposite aspect of it with all these transfers from the previous after which with Smikle, Te-Biasu, Kubek, Poffenbarger, Dalce and McLean. Meyers was so key throughout our 2023 Elite Eight run and Benzan shot 50 % from 3 with 93 makes one season! And so many nice personalities. (Did you see Dalce this yr?!) I’ve discovered which you can make lasting reminiscences, and an enduring influence on a program and fanbase, in only one or two seasons.

Whiplash, sure. But additionally pleasure.

And don’t neglect that particular feeling of seeing a participant come house, as we skilled with Meyers, Brown-Turner, Poffenbarger and McLean; in the meantime Kubek was already house when she performed at Towson College in Maryland. (Not saying this was the case with the entire gamers I simply talked about, however some transfers dream of taking part in for Maryland and solely go some place else initially as a result of they’re not recruited by the Terps out of highschool.)

Photograph by Greg Fiume/NCAA Photographs by way of Getty Pictures

The query now could be the place do the Terps go from right here? Can they actually plug in a roster filled with transfers and count on the identical superb chemistry again and again? It appears unlikely to me.

Frese has continued to recruit very nicely. It goes with out saying that getting the No. 4 recruit in Austin (2018) and the No. 2 recruit in Reese (2020) had been big accomplishments. However each of them transferred away earlier than they had been in a position to deliver Maryland previous the Candy Sixteen. Within the case of Austin, she by no means helped us out of the Spherical of 32, although she was a key a part of a No. 4 AP ballot end to the NCAA Match-less 2020 season. Different high recruits from the DMV space in Azzi Fudd and Kiki Rice went elsewhere, partly contributing to Maryland’s 10-year-long Remaining 4 drought and 19-year-long nationwide championship drought.

Ought to we hope for extra four-year Terps? Or, is it really attainable to plug in a ton of transfers yearly and constantly make it to the Candy 16 and past? Is that this the brand new regular in faculty basketball?

I do know this: Previously two seasons since our Elite Eight look, we have now overachieved. We weren’t anticipated to do a lot in 2024 and beat a top-five group for the primary time since 2014 en path to a NCAA Match look that will have become second-round look had No. 7 seed Iowa State not made an unbelievable comeback. And this yr, we began of ranked No. 18 earlier than proving ourselves worthy of an Elite Eight bid or past.

Beforehand, Frese had solely overachieved at Maryland (in line with event seeding, at the very least) in 2004 (taking a No. 12 seed to the second spherical), 2006 (profitable the title with a No. 2 seed) and 2014 (taking a No. 4 seed to the Remaining 4). Extra usually, her Terp groups have underachieved: 2007 (No. 2 seed dropping within the second spherical), 2008 and 2009 (No. 1 seed dropping within the Elite Eight each years), 2011 (No. 4 seed dropping within the second spherical), 2016 (No. 2 seed dropping within the second spherical), 2019 (No. 3 seed dropping within the second spherical) and 2021 (No. 2 seed dropping within the Candy 16).

Does the latest overachievement point out that the Terps have a bit further combat in them of late? Can they capitalize on this renewed vitality and eventually construct all the way in which again as much as one other championship, which might be Frese’s second. At greatest, we’d win it subsequent yr and it’d be 20 years later, which might be much like Notre Dame’s Muffet McGraw’s 17-year hole between first and second. (Stanford’s Tara VanDerveer had a 29-year hole between second and third.)

Somebody who’s been eliminating gaps currently—and never simply in Aflac commercials—is Daybreak Staley. Staley has received three chips within the final eight years and her South Carolina program looks as if it’s going to be the go-to vacation spot for recruits for the foreseeable future. Does this imply she might chase Tennessee’s Pat Summitt (eight titles) and UConn’s Geno Auriemma (11)?

Frese is a third-tier all-time coach who’s hoping to spice up her legacy. Geno and Pat make up the primary tier. The second tier contains Kim Mulkey (4), Staley, VanDerveer and McGraw. Although she doesn’t have the long-term physique of labor of those others, Linda Sharp is the opposite multi-championship coach, having taken USC to the promised land twice over her 12 years (1977-89) on the helm. Frese is certainly one of 9 coaches with one chip.

Seeing if Frese and the Terps can capitalize begins subsequent yr, when hopefully McDaniel, Smikle and Poffenbarger can be again. That’s not unhealthy for a giant three, particularly since they now have expertise taking part in collectively.

And who is aware of? Perhaps we’ll see some new Maryland heroines emerge from the switch portal as soon as once more.