KANSAS CITY, Mo. – Jared Nickens and Jake Layman scored 15 points apiece to lead a balanced attack, and Maryland beat No. 13 Iowa State 72-63 on Tuesday night in the championship game of the CBE Classic.
Dez Wells added 14 points and Melo Trimble scored 11 for the Terrapins (5-0), who built a 15-point lead with three minutes left before hanging on down the stretch.
It was a happy homecoming for Terps coach Mark Turgeon, who grew up in Topeka and starred at Kansas before coaching at Wichita State. He improved to 6-0 in his career against Iowa State, the majority of those wins coming while he was coaching at then-Big 12 rival Texas A&M.
Bryce Dejean-Jones had 17 points to lead the Cyclones (3-1), who won the Big 12 title in the same building in March. Georges Niang added 10 points, but was 4 of 14 from the floor.
Maryland carried a 37-34 lead into the break, but that advantage swelled in the second half. The cold-shooting Cyclones missed their first eight field-goal attempts, struggled to get clean looks in the paint and clanked a series of jumpers and 3-pointers off the iron.
By the time Wells scored with 14:37 to go, the Terps had stretched their lead to 43-34.
Niang finally scored Iowa State's first points of the second half when he got a basket with 14:28 left, but Dion Wiley answered with a 3-pointer at the other end.
Every time the partisan crowd that had made the trek south on Interstate 35 from Ames tried to get Iowa State energized, the Terps were there to quiet them. Wells kept cutting to the rim for easy lay-ins, and Trimble showed once again why he's one of the top freshmen in the country.
After pouring in 31 points in the Terrapins' semifinal win over Arizona State, the athletic point guard was 4 of 8 from the floor while doing a better job of getting teammates involved.
Frustration set in for Iowa State down the stretch. Dustin Hogue missed an easy layup, and then hacked Trimble about 75 feet from the basket. Hogue took a seat on the bench with his fourth foul, and Trimble calmly made both fouls shots to give Maryland a 66-51 lead.
Moments later, the Dejean-Jones cross-checked Layman during a fast break — the Cyclones guard never even tried swiping at the ball — and was hit with a flagrant foul.
TIP INS
Maryland: Trimble was voted the tournament MVP.
Iowa State: Monte' Morris, who had 12 assists without a turnover in the semifinals against Alabama, had two assists and one turnover against the Terrapins.
UP NEXT
Maryland returns home to face Monmouth on Friday night.
Iowa State is off until Dec. 2, when it plays Lamar at Hilton Coliseum.
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