Next stop on the Terrapins’ road to the Final Four, the Sweet 16 in Bridgeport, Connecticut.
“We’re just trying to play great basketball and at this point of the season everyone’s trying to play their best basketball,” said Terps guard Shatori Walker-Kimbrough.
Third-seeded Maryland gets Oregon on Saturday morning after the tenth-seeded Ducks upset Duke to advance in the NCAA Tournament. Even with a potential Elite 8 rematch with 4-time defending champ UConn on the horizon, you better believe the Terps aren’t looking past their next opponent after getting ousted in the second round last year.
“You live and you learn and last year we learned very hard that if you start looking ahead you’re going to forget about the present moment,” said Terps guard Kristen Confroy. “So, it might sound cliche to take it one game at a time but we truly mean that.”
“You don’t get the chance to play UConn if we don’t win and they have to take care of their game with UCLA,” added Terps head coach Brenda Frese. “This team has never looked ahead on any opponent.”
While the Terps are looking forward, with all eyes on the Ducks of Oregon, plenty of talk on Wednesday still revolved around that three-quarter court heave by freshman Destiny Slocum that caught nothing but net in second-round the win over West Virginia. It’s a bucket that has her squarely in the limelight.
“I was shocked when I did it because I was like ‘it’s going to hit the backboard or it’s going to hit nothing.’ I’m just going to throw it up like usual. And then when it swished in I was like ‘Oh my gosh, I’m going to be famous.’ That’s what went through my head. This shot is going to be famous. I was hoping I could make it to the ESPY’s maybe,” said Slocum.
“As soon as it was headed across half court I was like ‘That’s going in.’ And it went in and it was crazy,” said Terps center Brionna Jones.
The craziness continues in just three days.
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