SEATTLE — Maryland men’s basketball’s loftiest perch in a decade also invited a precipitous fall.

Fortunately for the Terps, they ensured such a calamity would not occur. The No. 4 seed lived up to its billing and clobbered No. 13 seed Grand Canyon, 81-49, on Friday afternoon before an announced 17,024 in an NCAA Tournament first-round game at Climate Pledge Arena.

Senior power forward Julian Reese scored a team-high 18 points and was one rebound shy of his 15th double-double of the season with two blocks and two steals, and junior point guard Ja’Kobi Gillespie amassed 16 points, three assists, three rebounds, and two steals. Graduate student small forward Selton Miguel scored 13 points, and freshman center Derik Queen notched his 15th double-double of the season on 12 points and 15 rebounds and added three assists and two blocks.

The offense also got a season-high 11 points from sophomore shooting guard DeShawn Harris-Smith, who hadn’t scored that many since a 16-point performance in a season-ending 87-56 setback to Wisconsin on March 14, 2024, in the second round of the Big Ten Tournament. The former starter-turned-reserve also grabbed four rebounds.

Maryland (26-8) earned its largest margin of victory in an NCAA Tournament game, outpacing a 30-point victory over Wisconsin on March 17, 2002, in a second-round matchup in Washington, D.C. The team also advanced to the second round for the second time in the past three years.

“These guys have been resilient all year and knew we had the advantage inside,” coach Kevin Willard said. “Proud of the guys that they stuck with it. Got the ball inside. We played physical against a very good basketball team.”

The Terps will meet No. 12 seed Colorado State on Sunday at a time to be announced after the Rams upended No. 5 seed Memphis, 78-70, earlier in the day.

With the victory, the Terps avoided what would have been their earliest exit from the NCAA postseason since 2017, when that squad as the No. 6 seed in the West Region and lost, 76-65, to No. 11 seed Xavier in the first round. In an opening weekend group consisting of the Antelopes (26-8), Memphis (29-6), and Colorado State (26-9), they appear primed for their first run to the Sweet 16 since 2016 — and perhaps even beyond.

After an 81-80 loss to Michigan in a Big Ten Tournament semifinal on Saturday, Maryland improved to 7-1 after losses this season. The team has won those seven games by an average of 27.3 points.

The Terps triumphed despite off-court turmoil in the wake of coach Kevin Willard’s revelation Thursday that athletic director Damon Evans was “probably going to SMU” to fill the same role there after Rick Hart, who shepherded the school’s move from the American Athletic Conference to the Atlantic Coast Conference last summer, opted to leave at the end of the year.

Willard, who has been rumored to be a candidate for the head coaching vacancy at Villanova, also questioned Maryland’s name, image and likeness funds compared with those of other Big Ten counterparts and said he needs “to see fundamental changes done.” But that news did not affect the players, who rallied behind their coach.

“It’s not like it’s the first time somebody was talking about us negatively, talking bad about us,” said Reese, the Randallstown native and St. Frances graduate. “I feel like we’re kind of used to stuff like that. Just staying as a family. We knew what was up with us. So if we just keep doing that, we’re good.”

Willard defended his comments.

“These guys know exactly what’s going on,” he said. “I’ve been open with them, I’ve been honest with them, they know exactly what’s going on. I can’t control you guys. Whatever I say, you’re going to write whatever you want to say anyway. That’s why this is a waste of my time. We have a website that’s like TMZ. So I can’t do anything about it. I can’t do anything about Twitter, I can’t do anything about what’s going on. I can handle what we can handle.

“We were focused. I’m excited to be here, I’m excited for these guys. There’s nothing else to talk about. You guys just write whatever the hell you want to write, and I don’t give a [expletive], I really don’t. I’ll probably get a letter from the NCAA.”

The Terps were offensively balanced in both halves. They shot 51.5% (17 of 33) in the first half, including 44.4% (4 of 9) from 3-point range, and 50% (14 of 28) in the second half, including 42.9% (3 of 7) from long distance.

After opening the game converting just two of its first 11 shots, Maryland went 15 of 22 for the remainder of the first half and 29 of 50 for the rest of the game.

“I think everybody was just nervous a little bit [and] let that get to us,” Gillespie said. “But we locked in defensively, and that helped our offense.”

Maryland also turned up the heat defensively. The Antelopes converted only 28.6% (16 of 56) of their attempts, including 21.7% (5 of 23) from deep, and were mired in droughts of 3:30 and 3:02 in the first half and 4:17 and 3:59 in the second.

With 3:08 remaining in the game, Willard pulled the last of his starters and had his reserves on the floor.

“We just stayed together as a team and just kept punching and just kept punching and just kept punching,” said Queen, a Baltimore resident. “We just defended. We did everything well that we usually do as a team, and we went out there and played hard.”

Grand Canyon graduate student shooting guard Tyon Grant-Foster scored a game-best 23 points and finished with four points and three assists, but that effort wasn’t enough to prevent four-time Western Athletic Conference Tournament champion and NCAA postseason qualifier from getting bounced in the first round for the third time in the past four years. Grand Canyon (27-7) had been hoping to advance to the second round for the second year in a row.

After falling behind 7-2 less than six minutes into the game, the Terps scored nine unanswered points fueled by Reese’s four points to assume an 11-7 lead midway through the first half. The two sides then exchanged buckets before Maryland scored the game’s next 11 points and 18 of the next 19 for a 33-13 advantage that was its largest of the opening frame.

Grand Canyon narrowed the deficit to 42-28 at halftime thanks to Grant-Foster, who scored 12 of the team’s final 15 points of the first half, including a buzzer-beating 3. The two-time All-WAC first-team selection had a game-high 16 points in the period.

Antelopes coach Bryce Drew lamented the team’s inability to develop a rhythm offensively.

“It’s like every one we missed, it kind of just sucked a little bit of energy out of us,” he said. “You can talk about [how] your defense has to carry you and give you energy, but then at the end of the day, you’ve got to make something on that end to help build some energy on the defensive end. So I think it was deflating as we missed open shot after open shot. It really hurt us.”

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