Can Maryland Point Guard Melo Trimble Save His Team?

Melo Trimble and Maryland have announced their presence, loud and clear. But for a deep March run, the Wooden Award candidate has to find his voice.

- Hallie Grossman

Melo Trimble will take Maryland’s final shot. He knows it. Northwestern knows it. Every one of the 17,144 onlookers inside College Park’s Xfinity Center knows it. Even if this mid-January contest is still in doubt, locked at 48-48 with 16 seconds left, this much is no mystery.

As the sophomore point guard shakes past two defenders, banners of Terrapins past John Lucas, Len Bias, Juan Dixon—hang from the rafters, an ever-present whisper of the heights this team used to reach. Trimble pulls up and releases—one more big-time attempt in a young career filled with them and watches as it falls short.

If the wayward 3-pointer rattles him, though, his face does not betray it. He’s all calmness and Zen. On Maryland’s first overtime possession, he takes his place, again, just behind the arc. He darts through five Northwestern defenders, lifts a floater into the basket, then falls to the floor, a tangle of limbs. The whistle blows. And-1.

It will be, arguably, just the third-most dazzling play he pulls off in overtime, a pair of no-look assists still to come, to help the Terps fend off this feisty Northwestern troop. But upon hitting the floor, he does not bump his chest or yell or grandstand. Trimble, with his frosted-tip hair inspired by Odell Beckham Jr.’s, breaks into an easy smile.

Even at this crucial moment, he is quiet. Oftentimes, he’s too quiet for his team’s own good, the byproduct of an acute strain of shyness he’s been fighting all his life. If all Trimble were asked to do for the Terrapins was score points and help his teammates do the same, he’d happily oblige.