Greivis Vasquez walked through the runway to the Maryland locker room and left others to observe the madness unfolding behind him. James Gist squatted under the basket near the Terps bench, hands clasped over his head, also unable to look.
But they both had to hear all the whooping and hollering and slapping of sneakers at the opposite bench, where the Clemson players had swarmed to celebrate. There was no other noise to drown them out. Comcast Center was as silent and shocked and hurting as the players were.
This 6-year-old building has never witnessed a loss as grotesque as the one last night. The Terps' old home, Cole Field House, has at least one scarier ghost, from 2001, the infamous Duke collapse. That team still made the Final Four. This one? Well, Gary Williams, in the shell-shocked aftermath of the 73-70 punch in the face, unscrunched his face long enough to speak on the public-address system, on the post-game radio show, and offer one last, desperate plea to the slack-jawed fans.
"It's not over yet," he insisted.
Of course not. If it's not over when you have a 59-39 lead, at home, with 11:21 left, with everything riding on this game and with time running out on the season and your NCAA tournament hopes - then nothing is ever over.
Twenty points, 11:21 to go. Even with a team as wildly unpredictable as this one, which makes the teams of the past four years look like the old Lucas-Elmore-McMillen dynasty, the Maryland faithful should have felt fairly safe. They could have been forgiven for making arrangements for two weekends from now, the start of March Madness. The Sunday after next was shaping up to be a restful one - no fists or teeth clenched, hoping Maryland's name would appear on a line on that NCAA bracket.
Then the Terps coughed up one of the all-time furballs ever witnessed in these parts. Now, that bracket is looking faint, as faint and distant as the look in the eyes of everybody in Comcast not wearing blue and orange last night.
Now, beating Virginia in Charlottesville next Sunday isn't even close to being enough. Maryland needs an Atlantic Coast Conference tournament run, maybe a 2004-level stampede, to make up for this gag job.
Selection Sunday is shaping up to be See-ya-later Sunday. Again. For the third time in four years. There's not enough sugar in the metropolitan area to coat that.
