James Gist

COLLEGE PARK - The mood was all business when the Maryland basketball team met yesterday morning for its first practice of the college basketball season, but just hours earlier, it was all about fun and games. The defending Atlantic Coast Conference tournament champions reveled in the attention from a capacity crowd at Comcast Center that started lining up outside the arena for Midnight Madness festivities before the doors opened at 9 p.m. Friday and didn't leave until 12:45 yesterday morning.

Allegany College sophomore point guard Sterling Ledbetter, who signed with the University of Maryland last month and is expected to back up veteran John Gilchrist, is hospitalized after being hurt in a car accident early Monday while driving back to school. Ledbetter, who played at Laurel High before enrolling at Allegany in Cumberland, apparently fell asleep at the wheel of his vehicle while traveling on Interstate 70 in Frederick County, state police said. He had to be cut from the car before being flown by helicopter to Washington County Hospital in Hagerstown.

COLLEGE PARK - Maryland basketball coach Gary Williams wasn't sure the Terrapins needed a wake-up call, but at the very least, he hopes his team learned a valuable lesson from its first exhibition game. After a 100-85 victory eight days ago over Division II Bryant University, several Terps acknowledged that the team played with a lack of effort and intensity, especially on the defensive end. Bryant repeatedly found open shots and drained 12 first-half three-pointers - 15 for the game - triggering Williams to say later that "our defense stunk."

COLLEGE PARK - James Gist has been turning heads since joining the University of Maryland basketball team, and after his formal introduction to the Atlantic Coast Conference last night, the 6-foot-8 freshman reserve forward from Silver Spring has passed another test. Gist did not expect to play a career-high 31 minutes, nor did he figure to play long enough to get roughed up twice and still finish the game on the floor. But as the Terrapins' entire front line was collapsing in the face of foul trouble, Gist's role kept growing.

College Park -- Maryland senior forward James Gist, the team's leading returning scorer and rebounder, and sophomore forward Landon Milbourne will be suspended for the Terps' regular-season opener at 8 p.m. Sunday against North Florida, coach Gary Williams said yesterday. Gist and Milbourne, both projected starters for tonight's 8 p.m. exhibition game against Concordia, participated in one day of the Maryland State 5-on-5 Tournament in Ocean City in April. By playing, they violated NCAA bylaw 14.7.

COLLEGE PARK -- As Virginia Tech began a steady parade to the free-throw line at Comcast Center late Wednesday night in the process of sealing a 69-65 victory, a frustrated group of Maryland students started chanting derisively. "NIT ... NIT ... NIT," they yelled. The students were directing their taunts at the Hokies, but they could have been referring to their Terrapins as well. For the first time in nearly two months, Maryland looked like a team that was headed to March's secondary event and not one that has recently looked to be one going to the NCAA tournament.

COLLEGE PARK - Dave Neal and his fellow Terrapins know what fans and the media were saying about them before the basketball season began. They know Maryland, which has missed the NCAA tournament three of the past four seasons, was selected by pundits to finish at or near the bottom of the Atlantic Coast Conference after losing shot blockers and double-digit scorers James Gist and Bambale Osby to graduation. At least so far, the Terrapins have managed to use all those gloomy predictions as incentive.

COLLEGE PARK - - When the 2008-09 season ended, Maryland men's basketball coach Gary Williams couldn't help but think ahead to when his undersized team would have enough height to compete "2 feet over the rim." That time has arrived - or so Williams hopes. Maryland staged its annual preseason media day at Comcast Center on Thursday and officially welcomed two of last season's missing ingredients - a pair of power forwards. Freshman Jordan Williams is nearly 6 feet10 and weighs about 260 pounds.

COLLEGE PARK -- It wasn't tough locating Maryland's seniors on the floor last night. James Gist was the one scoring Maryland's first 11 points, the one swatting an opponent's first-half jumper so hard that it bounced off the glass and headed back toward midcourt. He was the one generally wreaking havoc against an inexperienced, undersized Northeastern team that - thanks partly to a bevy of Maryland turnovers and missed foul shots - managed to make the Terrapins sweat before finally falling, 74-72, in overtime.

COLLEGE PARK - If Maryland coach Gary Williams sticks with his plan of using four perimeter players in most games, it means the team's lone big man will have the pressure of being productive on the interior. The play of Maryland's big men in Friday's season-opening, 81-52 win over Bucknell gave more reason for pause than hope going into tonight's game against Youngstown State (0-1) at Comcast Center. Sophomore center Braxton Dupree started the opener and struggled to the point where Williams pulled him for a stretch early in the second half.