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Maryland continues its surge by ending Duke's

Mar 1, 2007 - 7:04 AM DURHAM, North Carolina (Ticker) -- Mike Jones and D.J. Strawberry gave Maryland all it needed to keep rolling towardthe postseason.Jones scored 25 points and Strawberry added 17 as the Terrapinsposted an 85-77 victory over No. 14 Duke in an Atlantic CoastConference matchup.Maryland (23-7, 9-6 ACC) has won six straight and is streakingat just the right time heading into the conference and NCAATournament."Maryland is playing lights-out basketball. They're reallygood," Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski said. "They played as wellagainst us tonight as anybody has played against us all year. Ithink they could go against anybody."The Terrapins led by as many as 12 points in the second half,but the Blue Devils rallied to tie the game, 64-64, on a3-pointer by freshman Jon Scheyer with 5:39 to play.But Duke never took the lead and Strawberry hit a 3-pointer andadded another basket during a 7-0 run that gave Maryland a 71-64lead with 3:52 remaining. Duke would get no closer than threepoints the rest of the way."I don't think it was realistic to be up by 11. In other wordsI thought Duke was going to make a run - it was just a matter oftime," Maryland coach Gary Williams said. "We've played toomany times. I told our players, just stay tough. You hope youget a stop. I don't think they got the lead - I think they tiedit up. Once they get the lead - especially here - that can bea very tough situation."Ekene Ibekwe scored 17 points and freshman Greivis Vasquez added13 and 12 assists for Maryland, which swept the season serieswith Duke for the second time in three years.Greg Paulus scored 20 points, DeMarcus Nelson added 17 pointsand freshman Gerald Henderson came off the bench to score 15 forDuke (22-8, 8-7), which had won four straight games sincedropping four in a row."Playing games like this will only make us better," Krzyzewskisaid. "We are only playing really good teams. We just have tounderstand who we are and try to keep getting better and usethis game as an example of not following a game plan. Marylandis playing as well as anybody so that's a good thing for us."If you do lose, you should lose to someone really good who hasplayed well against you when you can learn from it."