Hard Truth For Terps: No Easy Contests

Maryland will take the Byrd Stadium field on Saturday looking to avenge a loss from last season. The Terrapins will enter with concerns about how they will contain an athletic dual-threat quarterback and attack a defense that features impressive overall speed.

Maryland's opponent, however, is not an ACC school or a high-profile nonconference foe, but instead a Middle Tennessee team that won all of five games last season with one of the nation's youngest rosters.

For the Terrapins, this is the new normal. A program that realistically chased ACC titles and top 25 rankings earlier this decade is now relegated to playing what is considered an almost evenly matched contest against a team not even expected to challenge for the Sun Belt Conference title.

"They are a very good team," Maryland quarterback Chris Turner said. "They probably think they are better than us right now. We have a pretty good challenge on Saturday."

Regardless of reasons -- injuries, inexperience, parity -- Maryland has diminished already low outside expectations with two underwhelming performances, including last week's 38-35 overtime victory over division I-AA James Madison. What the Terrapins have demonstrated more than anything else this season is that they have the potential to lose to almost any team on any Saturday.

"We can't take any game for granted," Maryland cornerback Anthony Wiseman said.

That sentiment reflects a growing issue not only for Maryland, but for almost all power-conference teams. Parity became something of the norm when Utah became the first team outside a power conference to crash the Bowl Championship Series party after the 2004 season. Such balance was reemphasized three years later, when division I-AA Appalachian State beat then-No. 5 Michigan.

But the parity appears more pronounced this season. Brigham Young of the Mountain West Conference and Boise State of the Western Athletic Conference have already knocked off nationally ranked teams -- Oklahoma and Oregon, respectively -- and are strong contenders for BCS games. Two teams from the Colonial Athletic Association -- Richmond and William & Mary -- beat Duke and Virginia, respectively, during the season's opening week. And last week, Jacksonville State led Florida State until the game's final minutes, losing 19-9.

"A team that has not even had the level of success that some of the in-state teams have had took Florida State right to the wire," Virginia Coach Al Groh said. "We seem to be seeing it in many, many different circumstances."

There was a time when coaches such as Notre Dame's Lou Holtz would effusively praise inferior opponents during the week, then trounce them on Saturday. These days, praise is more warranted. Virginia Tech Coach Frank Beamer said more players at the lower levels of college football are capable of playing in major conferences.

Maryland linebacker Adrian Moten said he felt James Madison had several players who could play at Maryland. Coach Ralph Friedgen, when reminded that Middle Tennessee's mobile quarterback, Dwight Dasher, is only 5 feet 10, said: "So was [former Georgia Tech quarterback] Joe Hamilton. I'd take him again. Dynamite comes in small packages."

Friedgen's teams have struggled against non-BCS programs before, most notably when his 2003 team opened the season with a 20-13 loss at Northern Illinois, but that defeat came in overtime and the Huskies went on to win 10 games. Last season's 24-14 loss at Middle Tennessee stands as the worst loss in Friedgen's nine years at Maryland because the Blue Raiders won only four more games and were tied with Alabama for having the fewest number of scholarship seniors (nine).