No, Maryland message board denizens, the problem with the Terpies does not exclusively reside in the office of the head coach. (Though the subject of how after every Maryland loss there is certain to be a "Fire Cottle" thread is one I'm planning to look at later in the season; I am curious to hear what a guy who is 75-32 with three final fours and two ACC titles in seven years has done to arouse such anger, so feel free to drop me a line)

Certainly, Travis Reed's suspension did not help matters (and quite possibly was the difference in that 5-4 loss to Navy a fortnight ago). But Reed isn't entirely responsible for some of the things that are different about Maryland of the last two weeks as opposed to, say, late March.

Coach Dave Cottle sees a handful of problems. The faceoff issue is blatantly obvious. The Terps' struggles with groundballs is connected to it. And after being downright Navy-like in its scrappiness for much of the seaon, Maryland hasn't shown as much pluck the last two weeks.

(Goalie play isn't much of a concern. Both Brian Phipps --- whose turn it is to start this week --- and Jason Carter have save percentages better than 58 percent, inching ever closer to the 60 percent tipping point Cottle would like to see).

Of course, scoring at a goal-a-quarter rate in that span doesn't help. So there should be a different look to the Terps (7-4) tomorrow when they play host to Penn (5-5) at Ludwig Field.

"It's easy to make moves because we've been so inept," Cottle said.

One of the moves is easy. Reed will slide back into attack, which will free up Max Ritz to move back to the midfield for stretches of the game. It will also alleviate pressure on midfielders Dan Groot and Jeremy Sieverts --- one of them is less likely to see a pole tomorrow with Reed back in the mix --- and it allows Will Dalton to go back to the third midfield line and make that group viable again.

Ultimately, it will be Groot and Sieverts who will be asked to bump up their production. Groot has a goal on eight shots in the last three games. Sieverts is 0-for-10, a drought that stretches back to his goal at North Carolina on March 22.

"We have to see the emergence of Sieverts and Groot," Cottle said. "We beat the No. 1 team in the country at the time, but we didn't get a goal from our first midfield. We're getting good production from the second and third lines. The guys we kind of counted on to get to 20 goals need to get 20 goals."

This isn't much of a secret. Groot has nine goals and seven assists through 11 games; Sieverts is stuck on six goals (with six assists).

If history is any comfort, Groot had seven goals in Maryland's final three regular season games a year ago, while Sieverts had four.

The Terps need a win more than anything else tomorrow, but an improvement from their top two midfielders ranks a close second. Other than the faceoff conundrum (now at 50.6 percent for the season and falling), an inability to score from outside and free up the Baby Terps near the crease appears to be the flaw most likely to quickly scuttle Maryland's postseason hopes next month.

--- Patrick Stevens