FanPost

Maryland Fan Perspective of UMD-UVA game

I am not sure how UMD won that game. Really---it was a statistical anomaly. A poster at a UMD website had a stat (and I didn't verify it) that in games where one team has 3 turnovers and the other team has 0 turnovers, the team with 3 turnovers only wins just over 7% of the time. When you add in UVA out gained the Terps by 50 yards and the Terps had more penalty yards, statistically there was probably less than a 1% chance UMD wins that game. Don't know how you can look up games where the turnover battle is 3 to 0, the team with 0 turnovers outgains the other team by more than 50 yards, and the team with three turnovers has more penalty.

So how does UMD win? Luck--definitely. Also timing. Lets face it not all yards and plays are the same. 5 yards at your own thirty yard line is a nice pickup whereas five yards at teh opponents five yard line is the difference between 7 and 3 points, a 4 point swing. Most 5 yards are not worth 4 points. The Terps had 5 RZ possession and got 27 points whereas UVA had 6 RZ possessions for 26 yards. The UVA TE had the best catch of the night on that one hander, but the Terp WR Deon Long had the most important catch of the night when he highpointed the ball and beat out two UVA defenders for a 47 yard catch on 3 and 21 when the Terps were down 26-20 in the fourth quarter. Timing matters and that is how UMD pulled a 1/100 where they won a game despite losing the turnover battle 3-0, getting outgained, and have more penalties against them.

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