Better Know a Conference: Big Ten (Part II)

Taking stock of the rest of the 18-team Big Ten after the first post ran too long

Photo credit: On Wisconsin Magazine

Better Know a Conference is Buzzer’s league-by-league preview of the 2024-25 season, featuring detailed but legible takes on every team in every major league — and other conferences and mid-majors along the way — in rough order of expected finish.

To read the full series (and start posting on the best college hoops comment section on the Internet!) consider becoming a paid subscriber today. Today: The Big Ten, Part II, because the first Big Ten post got very long and it turns out there are 18 teams in this league now. Who knew?!

Maryland

Maryland fans don’t need anyone else to tell them, but what a frustrating basketball team they were a year ago. Imagine being a Maryland fan last year! After a solid first season, Kevin Willard’s second Terps group was an offensive disaster that finished 12th in points per trip in the Big Ten and 155th in the country, that played at a glacial sub-300 pace, that made 3s at a (gulp) 28.9 percent rate (DI rank: 347!) … and that also guarded extremely, extremely well.

The resounding visual of the 2023-24 Maryland Terrapins season was someone hoisting some terrible shot off the back iron, the other team bringing the ball down the floor and running offense, Kevin Willard stomping his feet in equal parts anger and encouragement, and Maryland getting a stop. Would they convert that stop into points and any kind of advantage? No! Does the combination of awesome defense and horrible offense drive fans a specific kind of crazy? Absolutely. But — getting stops is good. You can build on getting stops.

That is the fundamental reason to be excited about Maryland this year: the continuation of excellent half-court defense with a bit more talent on the other end. Julian Reese is the chief character here. Reese was one of the best interior defenders and rebounders in the country last season, the primary reason Maryland held opponents to 45.7 percent shooting inside the arc — Willard’s defense ran teams off the 3-point line before Reese funneled attackers to the inefficient midrange.