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Rapid reaction: Maryland’s late rally enough to escape Champaign with victory
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Friday night’s game in Champaign isn’t going to be one Mike Locksley points to as the pinnacle of Maryland’s season. It was an ugly contest filled with unforced errors and costly mistakes.
Yet Maryland found a way to leave Memorial Stadium with a victory when the final seconds ran off the clock.
Trailing 17-10 with under 5 minutes to play, Taulia Tagovailoa engineered an 8-play, 86-yard drive that was capped by a 10-yard touchdown pass to Tayon Fleet-Davis to tie the game at 17-17.
Needing a defensive stop on Illinois’ ensuing possession, lineman Greg Rose came up with a pair of sacks on Brandon Peters, forcing the Illini to punt with 1:07 remaining in the contest and the game still tied.
After a short Blake Hayes’ punt, Tagovailoa completed a 26-yard pass to Rakim Jarrett then connected on a 6-yard strike to Fleet-Davis, setting up a game-winning field goal attempt for Joseph Petrino with 3 seconds to play.
Petrino drilled the 32-yard attempt, lifting Maryland to a 20-17 victory over Illinois and the Terrapins’ first 3-0 start since 2016. And they were lucky to leave on the right side of the scoreboard.
Maryland had 2 costly turnovers, committed 8 penalties equating to 63 yards and converted on just 2-of-10 attempts on 3rd down. For a majority of the game, the Terps looked like they’d fumble the game away.
Playmakers stepped up in a clutch situation, though. Tagovailoa finished the game completing 32-of-43 passes for 350 yards and a touchdown. Fleet-Davis totaled 62 yards and a touchdown on the ground and also had 44 yards and a score on the receiving side.
Both Dontay Demus Jr. and Rakim Jarrett made some important catches down the stretch. When the defense needed stops, Maryland pulled through.
As ugly as it was offensively, Maryland’s defense did keep Illinois in check. Peters was just 10-of-26 for 185 yards with an interception. The Illini averaged just 3.3 yards per carry and no receiver had more than 3 catches on the day.
Josh McCray and Chase Brown were bright spots for Bret Bielema’s team Friday night, but couldn’t do enough damage to improve to 2-2 on the season.
Throughout the course of a college football season, teams will play in ugly games like this. Maybe it wasn’t the brightest performance of the year, but Maryland heads back to College Park with a 3-0 record and a chance to add another tally to the win column next week against Kent State.
That’s all that really matters right now.
Dustin grew up in the heart of Big Ten country and has been in sports media since 2010. He has been covering Big Ten football since 2014. You can follow him on Twitter: @SchutteCFB