A trio of plays caused Maryland football’s demise in 37-17 loss at No. 4 Ohio State

Maryland football disappointed in its 37-17 loss at No. 4 Ohio State on Saturday. 

The Terps had a golden opportunity for a signature program win. Instead the Buckeyes handed them their first loss of the season. Maryland entered halftime knotted up with Ohio State and even led by two scores early in the second quarter. 

Then the Terps were outscored 27-7 in the second half. 

“For us to take that next step, we have to be able to make the plays that are there to be made,” coach Michael Lockley said. “Our best players [have] got to show up and make plays and we got to do a better job as a coaching staff of putting them in those positions to make plays.”

A win for Maryland was in reach — within two scores — until midway through the fourth quarter. There were three key plays that went the Buckeyes’ way, preventing the Terps from completing an upset.

Taulia Tagovailoa’s pick-six

Tagovailoa threw two interceptions on the day. His first miscue was massive, as safety Josh Proctor intercepted Tagovailoa and returned it 24 yards for a touchdown. That halted Maryland’s momentum and trimmed its lead down to three.

The Terps’ signal caller tried to squeeze in a pass for Tyrese Chambers, who sat in between the zones at the first down line. A combination of an inaccurate throw and an error in communication with Chambers led to Ohio State’s first points of the afternoon. 

“When you watch the tape, the receiver is supposed to turn inside, he turns outside, that’s a communication issue,” Locksley said. “The ball should’ve been thrown inside, we should have the receiver inside, but Lia is a veteran player, he’s played a lot of football for us we’ll win and lose with him.”

End of first half blunder

The Buckeyes scored a field goal with roughly 1:30 seconds left until halftime to tie the game at 10, giving Maryland’s offense possession with a chance for a quick points to go into the break with the lead and momentum.

The Terps drove down the field with a pair of third down conversions and the help of two Ohio State penalties. They reached the red zone with 12 seconds left and looked to take one final shot for six.

Except Tagovailoa checked the ball down to his running back underneath, short of the sticks in the middle of the field. Maryland’s offense scrambled to the line of scrimmage with zero timeouts remaining but was unable to spike the ball for a field goal attempt as the clock hit triple zeroes. 

“We wanted to take a shot in the endzone, we had 12 seconds on the clock,” Locksley said. “You take a shot, if it’s not there you kick a field goal. What you don’t want to do is check it down in that situation which we did and we prevented ourselves from again taking points before the half.”

Gambling on fourth down

The Terps’ decision to go for it late in the game wasn’t necessarily a bad one — down by 10 with just over nine minutes left in its own territory — but the play call they dialed up was confusing. 

Offensive coordinator Josh Gattis opted to run the ball on third-and-5 knowing he was prepared to use all four downs. The rush only gained two yards, setting up a fourth-and-3. Gattis kept the ball on the ground with Antwain Littleton II again, and the result was a turnover on downs as Littleton was swallowed up behind the line of scrimmage by a convoy of Buckeye defenders. 

“I’m sure we’ll see that there was some opportunities that we had that maybe affected us more than it was Ohio State,” Locksley said. “It’s my job to make sure we get those things corrected.” 

Ohio State struck for a touchdown a few plays later. Maryland didn’t score from that point on.