Indiana’s Focus On Reese, Queen Leads To Big Game For Maryland Guards

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. – Indiana fans boo every opposing player during starting lineup introductions. They were especially loud for Maryland freshman center Derik Queen.

Indiana recruited Queen hard, hosting the five-star recruit and nation’s 12th-ranked player for an official visit in September 2023 alongside his Montverde Academy teammates Liam McNeeley and Curtis Givens III. McNeeley was the only one of the trio to commit to Indiana, and he pitched Queen hard to team up in Bloomington.

"My first call would be to the man right here, Derik Queen," McNeeley said in October 2023 during his commitment announcement on ESPN. "We need Derik Queen to come be a Hoosier."

But Indiana ended up swinging and missing on the Montverde trio, as McNeeley backed out of his pledge in March and flipped to the back-to-back national champion UConn Huskies, where he’s averaging 13.6 points on 37.9% 3-point shooting.

Queen, a Baltimore, Md., native, stayed home to play for the Terrapins, and Givens wound up at LSU, where he scores 4.8 points per game. Sunday was the first, and possibly only time, Indiana will have faced any of the three this season.

Maryland center Derik Queen (25) guarded by Indiana wing Luke Goode (10) at Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall. | Robert Goddin-Imagn Images

Queen was likely a major focus on the Indiana scouting report going into the game. The 6-foot-10 freshman center was Maryland’s leading scorer at 15.6 points per game before Sunday’s noon ET tip off at Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall.

Indiana tweaked its starting lineup to adjust to Maryland’s big-man duo of Queen and senior forward Julian Reese. That frontcourt tandem entered Sunday’s game after massive performances to lead Maryland to a 91-70 win Thursday at Illinois. Reese scored 27 points and grabbed 17 rebounds, and Queen racked up 25 points, six rebounds and four assists.

Luke Goode had been starting for the Hoosiers since Dec. 21 against Chattanooga, but Indiana coach Mike Woodson replaced him with Malik Reneau to combat a strong Maryland frontcourt. Reneau effectively missed seven games due to a knee injury, and he had to shake off some rust Wednesday at Northwestern, going 0 for 6 in 11 minutes.

That set up a heavyweight frontcourt matchup between Indiana’s Reneau and Ballo against Maryland’s Queen and Reese. Reneau spent much of Sunday’s game matched up against Queen, his high school teammate, which added to the intrigue.

“[Queen] is kind of familiar with [Reneau’s] game,” Reese said. “... I feel like he did great on him. Coming into the game, it was kind of personal, kind of a chip on his shoulder, and I feel like he took advantage of that.”

Ballo and Reneau had the upper hand early, scoring the game’s first two baskets inside. But Queen got on the board by using his quickness to drive baseline and get around Ballo for a reverse layup. He made a smooth, turnaround jumper off the dribble over Ballo to give Maryland a 16-13 lead.

Ballo used his 7-foot, 265-pound frame to bump Queen out of the way for a dunk. Reese scored eight points in the final nine minutes of the first half to give Maryland a 38-37 lead at the break. Through 20 minutes, the highly anticipated big-man matchup was delivering, with Reese and Ballo each totaling 10 first-half points.

“[Ballo] is a great player,” Reese said. “Coming from a really physical conference, he’s a really physical guy, kind of getting used to it. But I feel like that’s Big Ten basketball and I’m used to that by now.”

Reese opened the second-half scoring by slipping past Ballo on a pick-and-roll and scoring over Reneau. Maryland seemed to confuse the Indiana defense on the next possession as Reese found Queen with an underhand scoop pass for a dunk. Reese said postgame he and Queen are really clicking as an offensive duo.

The Terrapins threatened to pull away after long, cross-court passes from Reneau and Ballo became turnovers, which led to layups and a 57-48 Maryland lead. But after a Ballo dunk and Reneau layup, Ballo found Rice for an open 3-pointer, and Indiana was back in the game, trailing 64-61 with 7:57 to play.

Indiana trailed Maryland for nearly 30 minutes on Sunday, but the Hoosiers found themselves in position to win the game after a Reneau layup put them ahead 75-50 with 3:07 to play. With the clock winding down, Indiana had done well to limit Reese and Queen.

Reese finished with 14 points on 5-for-8 shooting and 10 rebounds. Queen scored just seven points on 3-for-8 shooting, his third-lowest scoring game of the season, but he also added 11 rebounds, three assists, two blocks and a steal. Still, it was a far cry from the duo combining for 52 points and 23 rebounds Thursday at Illinois.

Perhaps that focus on limiting Reese and Queen inside led to bigger games than usual for Maryland guards Ja’Kobi Gillespie, Rodney Rice and Selton Miguel, a trio that combined for their most points all season. Rice led the way with 23 points, followed by Gillespie with 18 and Miguel with 15.

Maryland finished 12 for 24 from 3-point range, tied for its second-most made threes and its second best 3-point percentage all season. Rice, Gillespie and Miguel accounted for all but one of those attempts and agreed with coach Kevin Willard it’d be a way to exploit the Indiana defense.

“They helped a lot,” Rice said. “They were in the paint, the help side, and there was easy shots from the corners and the wings when they do that. So yeah, we took advantage of that.”

“You gotta make shots against Indiana,” Willard said. “The way they play defense is they really collapse the paint, and they do it as good as anyone, I think, in college basketball, so you gotta make shots. They dive under screens, and we told our guards you gotta just shoot the ball. Stop going in there and trying to challenge Ballo, just shoot threes, man. We do it at a high level, just keep shooting them and we got some open ones and made them.”

The biggest 3-pointer of the game came on a busted play in the final seconds. Gillespie lost the ball driving against Indiana’s Trey Galloway, but he avoided traveling and flipped the ball out to Reese at the high post. Improvising, Reese passed to a cutting Rice and immediately screened him open for what turned out to be the game-winning 3-pointer with seven seconds left.

WHAT A SHOT BY RODNEY RICE 😳

He puts @TerrapinHoops up by one 👀#B1GMBBall on CBS 📺 pic.twitter.com/jToin9pfBf
— Big Ten Network (@BigTenNetwork) January 26, 2025

“Just kind of second nature,” Reese said of his pass. “The play broke down. It wasn’t the original play.”

“We actually had a hammer screen going to the corner, and they blew it up,” Rice said. “[Reese] caught the ball around the elbow and then turned my way, and I went and got it, shot went up and it felt good when it left my hand.”

Indiana failed to execute on the final possession, leading to an air-balled 3-pointer by Myles Rice at the buzzer and a 79-78 loss. Letting a four-point lead slip away in the final 38 seconds left an even greater sting for Indiana, which fell to 14-7 overall and 5-5 in Big Ten play.

For Maryland, it was a lesson on how to win on the road. In Thursday’s 21-point win at Illinois, Reese and Queen led the way. In Sunday’s one-point win at Indiana, Maryland adapted and leaned on its guards.

“My message the last two weeks is let’s just keep getting better and learn how to win on the road,” Willard said. “I think the biggest thing is when we got down five, I was like, ‘Everyone just relax. We’ve been in this situation before. Let’s run our play. Let’s score. Let’s get back into it, get a stop.’ That was the biggest thing. I think they’ve learned that everything on the road’s not gonna go smooth.”

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