So, just how good is Maryland? Well, the two national polls have them at number 4, behind Michigan State, Kansas and Oklahoma, but ahead of undefeated teams like Xavier, SMU and South Carolina. Maryland has only one regular season game with Michigan State this season, and, sadly, it is at East Lansing. The one certainty with Maryland is that it will improve between now and the end of the season providing there are no injuries to its core players. The reason is Diamond Stone. The hotly recruited 6'11" freshman improves each game by leaps and bounds and it is a joy to watch. He is strong but will get stronger, and he can score points in big beautiful bunches. Right now, Maryland Coach Mark Turgeon is bringing him off the bench, which, Turgeon hinted, is something Stone isn't exactly overjoyed about. Turgeon is coy about his reasons for keeping the big man beside him as games start, saying that using him like he is helps keep the young man out of foul difficulty. Maryland is loaded up, what with their two sensational guards - Melo Trimble and Rasheed Sulaimon - and two talented and athletic forwards (Jake Layman and Robert Carter, Jr.), and a bench that could be the best anywhere. Turgeon starts the junior, Damonte Dodd, at center and brings Stone and 7'0" Michal Cekovsky off the bench. At guard on the bench is the deadly long-range shooter, Jared Nickens, and the suddenly lethal point guard, Jaylen Brantley.
One thing to remember about Maryland is that they have the ability to win the tight games. Their back court - Trimble and Sulaimon - are experienced, talented and cool under pressure. Trimble seems to be able to manufacture points even when the opponent is in a defense that seems to have Maryland's number. It is those clutch baskets that break the other team's resolve and keeps Maryland within striking distance even when an opponent is on a roll.
Maryland has a managable early schedule in the Big Ten. After Penn State in College Park tonight, they are at Northwestern on Saturday night and home against Rutgers one week from tonight. The Northwestern game cannot be overlooked. The coach of the Wildcats, Doug Collins, the former Duke guard, has Northwestern off to one of its best starts ever. And Northwestern has a goal that no other Division I team has: the school is the only one in a major conference never to play in the NCAA Tournament. A win over Maryland would be an incredible boost toward erasing that situation. Turgeon and his Terps cannot overlook the Wildcats. Fortunately, it is the first Big Ten road game of the season and it is hard to imagine Maryland taking such a challenge lightly.
This is a Terrapin team that could win a national championship. It is a long way away and Maryland has to avoid injuries to any of its key players. But the ability is there. It can happen,
A Poignant Poem by William Wordsworth
William Wordsworth, who is credited along with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, with founding the critical period of English Romanticism, was born in 1770 in Cockermouth, Cumbria, England. He lost his mother when he was only eight, and he became an orphan along with four brothers and sisters, when his father passed while Wordsworth was still at Hawkshead Grammar School. There is a wonderful, albeit brief, biography of Wordsworth at the web page of the Academy of American Poets (www.poets.org/poetsorg/poet/william-wordsworth).
The World is Too Much With Us
by William Wordsworth (7 April 1770 - 23 April 1850)
The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers:
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon;
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers;
For this, for everything, we are out of tune;
It moves us not.--Great God! I'd rather be
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn.
From the Book of Psalms, Psalm 49, from the beginning:
Verse 1: Hear this, all peoples!
Give ear, all inhabitants of the world,
Verse 2: both low and high,
rich and poor together!
Verse 3: My mouth shall speak wisdom;
The meditation of my heart shall be understanding.
Verse 4: I will incline my ear to a proverb;
I will solve my riddle to the music of the lyre.
Verse 5: Why should I fear in times of trouble,
when the iniquity of my persecutors surrounds me,
Verse 6: men who trust in their wealth
and boast of the abundance of their riches?
Verse 7: Truly no man can ransom himself*
or give to God the price of his life,
Verse 8: for the ransom of his (or their) life is costly,
and can never suffice,
Verse 9: that he should continue to live on for ever,
and never see the Pit.
Verse 10: Yea, he shall see that even the wise die,
the fool and the stupid alike must perish,
and leave their wealth to others.
Verse 11: Their graves** are their homes for ever,
their dwelling places to all generations,
though they named lands their own.
Verse 12: Man cannot abide in his pomp,
he is like the beasts that perish.
Verse 13: This is the fate of those who have foolish confidence,
the end of those (some add here: after them) who are pleased with their portion.
Verse 14: Like sheep they are appointed for Sheol;
Death shall be their shepherd;
straight to the grave they descend,
(some add here: the upright shall have dominion over them in the morning)
and their form shall waste away;
Sheol shall be their home.
Verse 15: But God will ransom my soul from the power of Sheol,
for he will receive me.
Verse 16: Be not afraid when one becomes rich,
when the glory (or: wealth) of his house increases.
Verse 17: For when he dies he will carry nothing away;
his glory (or: wealth) will not go down after him.
Verse 18: Though, while he lives, he counts himself happy,
and though a man gets praise when he does well for himself,
Verse 19: he will go to the generation of his fathers,
who will never more see the light.
Verse 20: Man cannot abide in his pomp,
he is like the beasts that perish.
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*another reading is: no man can ransom his brother
**other translations provide: their inward (thought)
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