Maryland forward Robert Carter Jr. becoming a more complete player

COLLEGE PARK — By the time Maryland men's basketball coach Mark Turgeon was about to begin a pregame walkthrough with his team around 8 a.m. Saturday morning, four hours before tip-off against Ohio State, Robert Carter Jr. had been there for 90 minutes.

"I walked in and Robert's already in full sweat, the only one in the gym," Turgeon recalled later.

Carter, who had been one of the country's most promising big men during his two seasons at Georgia Tech, showed that he is starting to develop fully as a Terp. In a dominant 100-65 win for No. 3 Maryland, the 6-foot-9, 235-pound power forward was the most dominant player on the Xfinity Center court.

After scoring his team's first eight points and 10 of its first 13, Carter finished with a career-high 25 points in just 23 minutes. Carter made 10 of 13 shots from the field, including all four of his 3-point tries, to go with five rebounds, two steals and two assists, including a neat feed to Diamond Stone for a dunk.

"It's great for him to make shots because he works so hard in making shots," Turgeon said. "His low-post game is one of the best in the country, and if you follow it and make 3s, we're really hard to guard. If you switch and go small, we're going to post him. If you don't, then you've got Melo [Trimble] coming off a screen."

Since missing nine of 12 shots, including all three of his 3-pointers, in a Jan. 2 win at Northwestern, Carter has made 28 of 42 shots from the field, including six of nine 3-pointers. His ability to score inside and outside -- often with passes from Trimble -- makes Maryland's pick-and-roll difficult to defend.

"A lot of teams, they're trying to trap me off the ball screens, or stay with me for a long time. When Rob is hopping like that, they can't stay with me too long," said Trimble, who finished with nine assists Saturday. "Ohio State did that early, but Rob hit a couple of 3s and they started to back off."

Along with Stone, who finished with 15 points for his 11th straight game in double figures, and senior forward Jake Layman, who scored 10, the Maryland frontcourt accounted for 50 points.

"When you have a point guard like Trimble, and you welcome in three guys that are that talented, he probably deserves a ton of credit because he has an innate ability to keep everybody happy," Ohio State coach Thad Matta said after his most one-sided defeat in 12 years with the Buckeyes. "Those guys with their size and skill level, this is as good a front line as there is in college basketball."

Carter envisioned what he did against the Buckeyes during his private workout earlier in the day. Carter said he watched tape of the Buckeyes on Friday night and took what he learned into the game.

"I try to do what I do every day -- get up, go out early and stay late, just make shots," said Carter, who has been known to come back into the gym in sweats after games for over an hour to shoot and work on his array of spinning inside moves.

Asked if he was as hot in his pregame workout as he was during the game, Carter said with a smile, "I shoot until I get hot if I'm not. I was hot at one point, yeah."

Carter said he is starting to feel comfortable back on the court after sitting out last season in accordance with NCAA transfer rules.

"I'm just getting adjusted to this team, finding my spots, watching a lot of film, seeing how different people are guarding me, things like that," Carter said. "I'm a basketball nerd and I'm learning. Some days my shots are going to be really good. Some days my shots are going to be just good."

Carter's hot shooting was contagious. The Terps shot 62.7 percent from the field (37 of 59) and 52.4 percent from 3-point range (11 of 21, including seven of 10 in the first half). Senior guard Rasheed Sulaimon hit nine of 10 from the field for a season-high 22 points, while Stone added 15 on 5-for-8 shooting.

Sulaimon said seeing Carter on the court early Saturday morning is something he expects.

"That's really how all our guys are. We always get here early, whether it's working on ballhandling, shots or post moves or after working on pick-and-rolls," Sulaimon said. "The character of our team is a hard-working team. It doesn't surprise me at all."

Knowing how much time Carter has put in to improving his 3-point shot -- he came into the game shooting 11-for-38 for the season -- as well as his overall game, Turgeon could barely contain his appreciation for the hard-working junior.

"I'm really happy for Robert. He really deserved a game like this," Turgeon said.

don.markus@baltsun.com

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