COLLEGE PARK, Md. – The three-seed Maryland Terrapins defeated Vermont 17-11 in the opening round of the NCAA Tournament from Capital One Field Sunday afternoon. Thomas McConvey led the Catamounts in their first-ever NCAA Tournament appearance with four goals and two assists. Tewaaraton Award finalist Jared Bernhardt scored six goals to lead the Terrapins to a quarterfinal matchup with No. 6 Notre Dame next weekend.
 
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Postgame Press Conference

COACH'S QUOTE
"We all knew it was going to be a tough task but you got to believe in yourself and you got to believe in all the training we put into this thing and sometimes it doesn't go your way," Head Coach Chris Feifs said. "I think it just comes back to how you keep it in perspective and letting that fuel us in the offseason to work on our skills and work on our schemes and find other ways to keep us comfortable, keep us efficient and keep us clean in these pressure moments when you go against really athletic, really well-coached teams. Because everybody in the tournament is really-well coached they're going to give you their best game. While we fought for 60 minutes today and really did some things I'm very, very proud of I knew we didn't play our best game. Maryland was certainly a part of that but also this moment is something we haven't experienced and you have to go through these tough times sometimes to really have perspective on it and as coaches it's our job to help them gain perspective and see it clearly. So, that's what we're going to do."
 
HOW IT HAPPENED

• Through the first 11:08 of the first quarter the teams were tied at two. JJ Levandowski scored the first of the game for Vermont with a shot labeled for the top corner. Then Thomas McConvey converted on UVM's first EMO of the game to tie things at two with 3:52 left in the opening 15. Levandowski found McConvey alone in front for the Catamounts equalizer.
• The Terrapins closed the first quarter strong, scoring three goals in 69 seconds. Maryland scored in transition off back-to-back UVM turnovers to make it 4-2 with 26 seconds left in the quarter. Maryland's Bernhardt made it a first quarter hat trick with 10 seconds left in the quarter pushing it to 5-2.
• The Terrapins made it a 5-0 run with two second quarter tallies 56 seconds apart to make it 7-2 with 10:27 left in the frame. McConvey ended the Terps spurt with his second of the game with 6:10 remaining in the half. Liam Limoges found McConvey in front and he one-touched the Limoges pass past Maryland's Logan McNaney.
• After Bernhardt's fourth goal of the afternoon UVM's Jonas Hunter closed out the scoring in the half answering back with 4:02 left. Stepping out from behind the net Hunter fired a shot to the top-corner for his fourth goal of the year making it 8-4.
• Levandowski scored his second of the game 2:20 into the second half to make it 8-5. He faked a shot evading a defender and fired it home to cut the lead to three. UVM held the Maryland offense in check until the late stages of the third quarter. The Terrapins scored two goals in 47 seconds to make it 10-5, before adding another to claim a 11-5 edge heading to the final frame.
• The teams traded goals in the fourth quarter, each scoring six. The Catamounts finished strong with three goals in 47 seconds in the final two minutes of the contest. McConvey made it four goals in the game, for the sixth time this season with 1:48 to play, then Levandowski converted his second hat trick of the season with 1:08 to go. Tommy Burke won the ensuing faceoff and scored his second of the season to close out the scoring with 1:01 remaining.

INSIDE THE BOX SCORE

• Tommy Burke won 11 faceoffs this afternoon, setting a new single-season program record in the process with 240. Luc Leblanc won 232 draws during the 2015 campaign.
• Burke also extended his own program record for ground balls in a single-season, he collected seven today and finished the season with 125.
• JJ Levandowski led all Catamounts with five shots on goal.
• Ryan Cornell made 12 saves in net for Vermont. It was the ninth time this season he made 10 or more saves for the Catamounts.