WASHINGTON- Villanova hit just eight of its 19 two-point attempts in the first half.
Luckily for them, the No. 3 Wildcats made up for that by hitting 11-of-22 three-pointers to take a 49-38 lead after 20 minutes.
You have to give the Terps some amount of credit for hanging in this one giving the Wildcats torrid start. The Terps hit 52 percent of their first-half shots, but each time they started to get their crowd in it here at Verizon Center, Villanova had a quick answer.
Sean Mosley leads the Terps with 12 points on 5-0f-5 shooting, while Jordan Williams is just two points away from his career high already with 10 points. Williams has six rebounds as well and hit all four of his free throw attempts, something he’s struggled with early in his Terp career.
Greivis Vasquez picked up two early offensive fouls and spent the rest of the half, shuffling between the court and the bench. He has just three points in nine minutes.
The Wildcats, whose biggest lead has been 14, got 15 points from Scottie Reynolds and 12 points from Corey Stokes on four three-pointers.
The Terps took a big hit there in the first half with the Wildcats breaking out to a quick lead with a three-point barrage, but they managed to control the damage pretty well in the last eight minutes of the half.
The first few minutes of the second half should tell us a lot about how close this one may or may not be down the stretch.
Eric Detweiler is The Diamondback’s Terrapin Men’s Basketball Team beat writer. He can be reached at edetweilerdbk@gmail.com. You can follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/edetweiler.