The No. 19 Rutgers men's basketball team defeated Maryland, 74-60, on Monday night inside the Xfinity Center in College Park, Md.
With the win, Rutgers moves to 5-0 and 1-0 in the Big Ten for the first time since joining the league in 2014.
"This has been a really tough place for us to play. It's a tough place for the whole league to play so to come on the road and get our first road win is a good feeling," Rutgers head coach Steve Pikiell said. "It's the first time we had to deal with a lot of traveling with COVID. Tough week week this week. All our guys have finals. They did a god job being locked in. We had some real stretches there where we did really good job defensively, settled down in the second half, and we didn't foul as much really helped a great deal."
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Rutgers was hit with early foul trouble on the road and was getting beat on the glass, but the Scarlet Knights buckled down and used a 10-0 run to take a 23-13 lead with 6:44 left in the first half. During the spurt, Myles Johnson and Cliff Omoruyi were on the receiving ends of stellar assists from Paul Mulcahy and Jacob Young, respectively.
But, Rutgers went cold after that, missing 1-of-11 field goals to end the first half as it went the last 2:43 without a bucket. Meanwhile, Maryland (4-2, 0-1) scored seven straight and outscored Rutgers 15-4 to take a one point, 28-27, lead into the break.
The second half started with some buckets back and forth until Rutgers started taking control with a 10-0 run to go up 50-38 and it led by as much as 14.
Ron Harper Jr. scored 19 of his 27 total points in the final 20 minutes and the Scarlet Knights were hot from the floor, shooting 63.3 percent including 63.6 (7-for-11) percent from behind the arc. Rutgers outscored Maryland 47-32 after the break and has won all of its games thus far by double digits.
"It's great. Ron obviously had foul trouble in the first half, but Ron's a tough matchup. He's playing with really good confidence but I like his defense," Pikiell said. "I like that he's getting some assists too. I like his rebounds in traffic, so there's a lot of things he gives us. Tonight he had it going.
Young used his speed all game long getting through pressure and making life miserable on the defensive end as well. He finished with 11 points and three assists. Johnson grabbed 16 rebounds and tallied 10 points for a double-double.
Geo Baker, who missed the last three and a half games for Rutgers, made his return off the bench, playing 28 minutes with 15 points and three assists.
"He practiced yesterday. Had a good practice," Pikiell said. "He said he felt well. He practiced the day before for 40 minutes. He was out 18 days and was able to log a lot more minutes than I originally intended, but he felt good and kept him on the floor and he's a very prominent player and we it was great to have him back."
Rutgers held Maryland to 34 percent shooting and had 25 bench points compared to the Terrapins' nine. It led for 33:05 of the game.
It was the third matchup between the schools in as many days as Rutgers football defeated Maryland in overtime on Saturday and Rutgers women's basketball fell in a tight game at the RAC on Monday afternoon to a ranked Terrapins squad.
RUTGERS PLAYER OF THE GAME: Ron Harper Jr.
Harper., the team's leading scorer, netted 27 points. He has scored at least 15 points in very game this season and entered the game second in the Big Ten Conference making 45.8 percent of his 3-pointers.
(More on him later)
RHOOPS PLAY OF THE GAME: Paul Mulcahy to Myles Johnson dish and dunk
With the shot clock running down in the opening half, Mulcahy dribbled the ball behind his back, drove inside the paint, and passed it off to Johnson who flushed it home.
UP NEXT: Rutgers returns to Piscataway and hosts No. 13 Illinois in a big early season Big Ten clash set for Sunday, Dec. 20 at 1:00 p.m. on ESPN 2.
"Tomorrow's a day off and then it's on to our next obstacle, which is an excellent Illinois team," Pikiell said.
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