alex len

The Maryland men's basketball team weathered a late surge from Alabama on Tuesday night, beating the Crimson Tide, 58-57, and earning a trip to Madison Square Garden for next week's NIT semifinals.

Baltimore Sun reporters Jeff Barker and Don Markus and editor Matt Bracken weigh in on the three biggest topics of the past week in Maryland sports.

Don Markus breaks down Maryland's victory over Denver in the second round of the NIT.

Dez Wells scores 19 points to continue the season for Maryland

Coach Mark Turgeon is hoarse with a bad cold, scoring leader Dez Wells has been nursing a sore knee since midway through the ACC tournament, and Maryland has had to get over playing four games in seven days and not making the NCAA tournament.

Forget Duke. Maryland's poison this season was North Carolina, which used its quick-strike offense to run the gritty Terps out of their best ACC tournament since 2009.

The seventh-seeded Terps extended their visit to Greensboro Coliseum by defeating Wake Forest, 75-62, behind Dez Wells¿ strong second half.

Projected as an NBA draft lottery pick, Len says he's still uncertain if he'll return to Maryland next season.

Dez Wells is a sophomore but played for Xavier last season. A handful of other players in Maryland's regular rotation — four freshmen and transfer Logan Aronhalt — are also making their ACC tournament debuts.

Maryland center Alex Len says it's too early to speculate on NBA future.

The Baltimore sports scene is blessed with a bunch of talented bloggers who bring their unique perspective to the conversation. Each week, Matt Vensel of The Baltimore Sun hopes to chat with one of them in a regular feature called Blogger on Blogger. This week, he exchanged emails with Dave Tucker, who writes about Maryland basketball for Testudo Times.

Terps should be heartened by how well they played in the first half against Virginia, when they came out with energy and attacked the baskets.

Maryland raced to a 17-point, first-half lead at Virginia before falling, 61-58, in overtime.

The Terps play their final regular season game Sunday night at Virginia which is on the NCAA tournament bubble.

Terps' coach Mark Turgeon's gloom-and-doom post-game press conferences are getting old.

Logan Aronhalt didn¿t pay attention to what was going on during Senior Night last season at Albany. A fourth-year junior, the 6-3 shooting guard was injured and not thinking much beyond trying to get back on the court for his senior year.

A solid 30-minute performance in a 10-point win over the Demon Deacons on Saturday in Winston Salem, N.C. — only Maryland's second ACC road victory this season and third overall — will likely give Howard another start Wednesday.

Analyzing Maryland's 67-57 victory over Wake Forest

With 23 points, Dez Wells is Maryland's only player to score in double figures

There's no way to sugar-coat it: the Maryland Terps are a mess right now.

Maryland is 16-2 at home this season. But the games to watch these days are the road contests.

The Maryland men's basketball team begins a critical four-game stretch to end the regular season tonight at Georgia Tech. The Terps are sixth in the Atlantic Coast Conference and have a 19-8 record overall, but they must make a statement the next two weeks to prevent their NCAA tournament bubble from bursting.

Goodluck Okonoboh, a 6-foot-8 center, ranked by 247Sports as the No. 26 overall player in country and No. 3 center, visited Maryland earlier this season with his coach and a couple of teammates.

Every Monday, Baltimore Sun blogger and reporter Matt Vensel will rank the most significant athletes and events in Baltimore sports that week based on accomplishments on and off the field. Because, well, why not?

This had all the makings of the day after the day after New Year's, when the hangover is still lingering. In Maryland's case, it was getting over the memories from Tuesday's deflating loss at Boston College that followed what had a chance to be a season-defining win over then No. 2 Duke.

The Terps defeated Clemson, 72-59, in front of a restless announced crowd of 15,373 at Comcast Center.

Baltimore Sun reporters Jeff Barker and Don Markus and editor Matt Bracken weigh in on the three biggest topics of the past week in Maryland sports.

At least now we know why Maryland coach Mark Turgeon had been so reluctant to speculate about Maryland's NCAA prospects.

While Turgeon considers it premature to speculate on Maryland's prospects, he knows that the team suffered a setback when it lost Tuesday night, 69-58, to a Boston College team that shut down Maryland center Alex Len.

After loss to Virginia, Maryland coach Mark Turgeon asked for more from his young team

Freshman guard hits both attempts with 2.8 seconds remaining to give Maryland victory over Blue Devils at Comcast Center

Dave O'Brien (play by play), Doris Burke (analysis) and Jeannine Edwards (reporting) did such a fine job that by the middle of the first half I had my notebook out trying to keep up with all the things they were doing right.

Freshman guard scored all 16 of his points in second half, including two free throws with 2.8 seconds remaining

Baltimore Sun reporters Jeff Barker and Don Markus and editor Matt Bracken weigh in on the three biggest topics of the past week in Maryland sports.

The malaise that seemed to grip the Maryland Terps in their dreary 80-69 loss to Virginia Sunday at Comcast Center even extended to Dez Wells.

For the first time this season, maybe for the first time since Mark Turgeon took over in College Park, there was a feeling of uneasiness that permeated Comcast Center.

The Terps fell victim to Virginia's defense and 3-pointers and lost, 80-69, in front of an announced 16,895 at Comcast Center.

With struggles of Pe'Shon Howard and Seth Allen, 6-foot-6 sophomore returns to point guard