CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Maryland sent a message yesterday to the men's basketball committee that seeds and selects the NCAA tournament.

Make us a No. 2.

The Terps were seeded second in the Atlantic Coast Conference tournament, and for 32 minutes against North Carolina yesterday, they put out a second-rate effort. Down by as many as 23 points, Maryland and Steve Francis mounted a furious charge, but ended up on the wrong side of an 86-79 semifinal upset by the Tar Heels.

Coach Gary Williams and the nation's No. 5 team had beaten No. 15 North Carolina twice in the regular season. They expected to meet top-ranked Duke in today's championship game. They wanted to watch tonight's NCAA selection show from here, and with Auburn losing earlier in the day, the path was open for Maryland to get one of the four No. 1 seeds.

Instead, the Terps were left to hang their heads in a despondent locker room. Stuck with a loss in the semifinals of the ACC tournament for the fifth straight year, they'll get NCAA news from a team room at Cole Field House.

"You have to learn to take it one game at a time, instead of trying to look at the big picture," Francis said. "We're going to have to come back as killers and champions if we want to accomplish something now."

Francis was a hero despite a touch of the flu, as he brought Maryland back with 19 of his game-high 31 points in the last 10 minutes. Williams said he was encouraged by the way his team performed down the stretch, when it rallied from a 62-39 deficit to trail by four points in the final minute and thrill a crowd of 23,895 at the Charlotte Coliseum.

Before that, however, the Terps (26-5) played with little of the fire that had placed them in position to tie the school record for wins in a season. A North Carolina zone lulled Maryland into jacking up too many three-pointers, and the Terps' vaunted pressure was not turned up until the Tar Heels (24-8) had a cushion too big to waste.

"We just couldn't get it going emotionally," Williams said. "Even then, you don't win 26 games just with emotion. You have to run good offense and good defense, and we didn't do that today. I take responsibility as a coach. My job is to get them ready to play and execute. We just didn't do that well enough early in the game."

Maryland did in its regular-season sweep of North Carolina, but this was a case of history outweighing current events. The Tar Heels' all-time record in Charlotte is 153-15. They hadn't lost an ACC semifinal since 1984 -- the last time the Terps have gotten to the title game -- and they had won the six previous tournament meetings between the two programs.

Karma and 23 points by sophomore Max Owens were with third-seeded North Carolina, which hit six of its eight three-pointers in the first half. A technical on Williams didn't help the cause, but a three-pointer by Terence Morris had the Terps within 36-34 heading into the last two minutes of the first half.

The roof then fell in on Maryland, as the Terps were outscored 26-7 over the next 10 minutes. Their first five possessions of the second half featured two turnovers and four missed shots. After the break, Maryland missed 18 of its next 20 shots, and finished with a miserable percentage of .386.

Morris, stuck in a shooting slump, never established himself inside, as eight of his 13 shots were three-pointers. Maryland had won six straight since Obinna Ekezie's college career was ended by an Achilles' tendon injury, but this was a game when the Terps finally missed their senior center, as centers Lonny Baxter and Mike Mardesich combined to shoot 2-for-10.

During North Carolina's big run, Maryland did not have a single basket inside the three-point arc. Its scoring consisted of a three-pointer by point guard Terrell Stokes and four free throws, as the old questions about the Terps' half-court offense were resuscitated by the Tar Heels' 2-3 zone.

"It's not like we fed into the zone, we just played too slow," Francis said. "We kind of played a little too slow."

Down 69-50, Maryland finally picked up the tempo and began to make someone else handle the ball beside North Carolina point guard Ed Cota. Nine of North Carolina's 21 turnovers followed, freshman Danny Miller supplied a big three and Francis scored 10 straight points for the Terps to get them within 76-68 with 2: 33 left.

Two years ago, Maryland climbed out of a 22-point hole to win at North Carolina, and the Terps were thinking deja vu when Stokes forced a turnover by Cota and Francis fed Morris.

The effort slumped when senior forward Laron Profit committed his sixth turnover, matching his career high. He was stripped on a drive with 1: 12 left by Ademola Okulaja, who won their matchup. Another North Carolina turnover led to a pair of free throws by Profit, but the Terps settled for trading points on their next two possessions, and were burned by a "touchdown" pass.

Miller's jumper from the right wing got Maryland within four for the last time. Okulaja inbounded and threw a long pass over Morris and to Brian Bersticker for an 82-76 lead with 25 seconds left.

"I told Brian, 'All five guys are going to be pressing,' " Okulaja said. " 'When you break, don't stop running at half court. It's the last option.' "

It was also last call for Maryland. Francis had hustled as far as the third row in press row trying to revive the Terps, but he ended the game with five fouls and on the bench, inconsolable. Asked how the Terps will rebound, Profit said, "I don't know if you do," but Williams was as defiant as ever.

"You're not a great player, or a competitor, unless a loss hurts," he said. "We had a chance to get to the finals of the ACC tournament and we didn't. It hurts me, it hurts the players, it hurts us as a team. We can't walk away from that."

Semi-frustration

Since Maryland last won the ACC tournament in 1984, the Terps haven't made it back to the final, losing in the semifinals eight times:

Year Opponent Result

1986 Georgia Tech L, 64-62

1988 N. Carolina L, 74-64

1989 N. Carolina L, 88-58

1995 N. Carolina L, 97-92*

1996 Georgia Tech L, 84-79

1997 N.C. State L, 65-58

1998 N. Carolina L, 83-73*

1999 N. Carolina L, 86-79 *

-Overtime

Pub Date: 3/07/99