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Countdown to Tipoff: Maryland Terrapins

Terrapins Notes

• One of six ACC teams with four starters returning from last season.
• Alyssa Thomas was part of a 3-way tie for ACC Coaches Preseason Player of the Year
• ACC Coaches and The Blue Ribbon Panel selected Malina Howard to their Newcomer Watch List.
• The Blue Ribbon Panel selected Alyssa Thomas, Tianna Hawkins and Laurin Mincy to their Preseason All-ACC Team.
• Alyssa, Thomas, Tianna Hawkins and Laurin Mincy were selected to the ACC Coaches Preseason All-ACC Team.
• The Blue Ribbon Panel selected Alyssa Thomas as their Preseason Player of the Year.
• The Blue Ribbon Panel Preseason Poll picked Maryland 2nd, with 18 first place votes.
• The ACC Coaches Preseason Poll picked Maryland 2nd, with 3 first place votes
• Maryland Freshman Malina Howard ranks No. 8 according to ESPN's HoopGurlz's analysis of incoming recruiting classes
• Maryland freshman Tierney Pfirman ranks No. 23 according to ESPN's HoopGurlz's analysis of incoming recruiting classes
• The Maryland tandem of Tianna Hawkins and Alyssa Thomas posted a combined 21 double-doubles in 2011-12 and enter this season with a combined 39 for their careers.
• The Terrapins return four of their five starters from last year's ACC Championship squad. They welcome back three All-ACC Team honorees and an All-American from their 2012 NCAA Elite Eight team. They are ranked No. 4 in the Lindy's preseason poll.
• Maryland welcomes a stellar newcomer class this year. Redshirt junior Katie Rutan, a transfer from a top 10 program in Xavier, is eligible. At Xavier, she shot over 39 percent from outside the arc and averaged over 8.0 points per game. Malina Howard, Chloe Pavlech and Tierney Pfirman make up Frese's ninth-straight top 10 recruiting class. Howard was the No. 1 post player and No. 6 overall recruit in the country. Pfirman was ranked No. 22 overall in the nation.
• One of the tallest teams in the country, they led the ACC in scoring and the nation in rebounding last season and return 73.5 percent of their offense and 75 percent of their rebounding. Maryland's average height as a team is once again over 6-0.
• Junior Alyssa Thomas is just the second junior in history to return as the ACC Player of the Year. She led the league in scoring last year, was named ACC Tournament MVP, a WBCA All-American, a First Team AP All-American, and a USBWA All-American.
• Senior Tianna Hawkins has made incredible strides in her career. As a junior, she made the All-ACC Second Team and led the nation with her field goal percentage of 62.3. Hawkins returns this year stronger and ready for action in the paint in 2012-13.
• Junior Laurin Mincy averaged 13.9 points per game last year, more than an eight-point difference from her 4.9 points per game as a freshman. Mincy led the Terps on their NCAA Tournament run when she averaged over 15 points a game, seven rebounds and shot 50 percent from outside the arc in those four games. She notched her first career double-double with 21 points and 12 rebounds in the Terrapins' Sweet Sixteen win over Texas A&M.
• The Terrapins own all 10 of the ACC's top attendance records and nine have come under Frese. They added one to the list last year vs. Duke, with over 15,000 fans in Comcast Center.

Brenda Frese, Maryland Head Coach

Entering her 11th season at the helm of the Terrapins, Brenda Frese has made a remarkable turnaround of the Maryland women's basketball program that won just 10 games in her first season ... The Terps won the program's 10th ACC title in 2012, finished 31-5 and went to their fourth Elite Eight under Frese ... After finishing 2011 with a 24-8 record, the Terrapins reached postseason play for the eighth consecutive season ... Coming off a 2006 Terp squad that won a school-record 34 contests and captured the ACC's second-ever NCAA crown, Maryland finished 28-6 overall in 2007 and 33-4 in 2008, the third and fourth consecutive 20-plus win seasons ... Frese guided the Terrapins to a 21-13 mark in 2010 -- their sixth 20-plus win season -- and reached the third round of the 2010 Women's NIT ... After earning a No. 1 final ranking in 2006 for the first time, Maryland garnered its first-ever No. 1 preseason ranking in both the Associated Press and ESPN/USA Today Coaches Poll ... Frese's success continued through 2009 as the Terps finished the season 31-5 and captured the program's first ACC title in 20 years ... Frese has guided the Terps to the NCAA Tournament six of the last seven seasons and has advanced to at least the second round of the Tournament for the sixth time in as many seasons ... Prior to becoming the third head coach in the history of Maryland's women's basketball program, Frese was named the 2002 AP National Coach of the Year and Big Ten Coach of the Year ... She led an 8-22 Minnesota team to a 22-8 season the next year (2002), one of the best one-season turnarounds in NCAA history ... Frese took the Gophers to what was only the school's second NCAA appearance, where they defeated UNLV in the first round of the NCAA Tournament before being eliminated by three points in the second round by North Carolina ... Frese started her head coaching career during the 1999-2000 season at Ball State, a program that had gone 66-169 in the nine seasons prior to her arrival ... Frese guided the Cardinals to a 16-13 showing in 2000 and garnered Coach of the Year honors in the Mid-American Conference ... She led Ball State to a school-best 19-9 mark in 2001, capturing the second back-to-back winning seasons in Ball State history ... Frese launched her Division I coaching career in 1994 as an assistant coach at Kent State University, helping the Golden Flashes to records of 20-8 (1994) and 17-10 (1995) during her two years there ... The Cedar Rapids, Iowa, native then joined Bill Fennelly's staff at Iowa State as the Cyclones' recruiting coordinator, where she assisted in another impressive turnaround, helping ISU to three NCAA Tournament appearances in four years.