Sophomore forward Steve Goins will not be present at tonight's game against New Hampshire at Comcast Center due to a violation of the Maryland athletic department's class attendance policy, according to a press release just issued by a team official.

The two-sentence release does not go into any further detail regarding Goins's suspension, citing the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act. It is unknown at this point whether Goins will travel with the team to Hawaii for the Maui Invitational, which begins Monday.

Coach Gary Williams said Thursday that Goins had returned to practice a day earlier and that the 6-foot-10 forward's lingering knee injury was progressing. Goins did not play in Maryland's first two regular season games, nor did he play in the exhibition contest Nov. 3, due to the knee injury.

Maryland team officials just handed out a press release announcing the signing of three members of its 2010 recruiting class. Point guard Terrell Stoglin, small forward Mychal Parker and power forward Ashton Pankey have signed their letters of intent to play for the Terrapins beginning next season.

"All three players should have an immediate impact on our program," Coach Gary Williams said in the release. "They have the maturity and ability to play at a high level."

The two-page release makes no mention of shooting guard Terrence Ross (Montrose Christian), who gave Maryland a verbal commitment in April but will wait until the spring to sign his letter of intent. Colleague Josh Barr broke that news earlier this week.

Assuming Ross eventually signs with Maryland, the Terrapins will bring in a 2010 recruiting class that ranks in the top 20 in the nation. Scout.com currently has Maryland's class ranked No. 19. Rivals.com slots Maryland's class at No. 15.

One of the interesting things to watch tonight when Maryland takes on New Hampshire at Comcast Center is how smoothly the team starts out on offense. In both of their first two games, the Terrapins got off to sluggish offensive starts before performing more effectively after halftime.

Per usual, Maryland has not struggled to create points in transition off of turnovers. But Coach Gary Williams repeatedly has said that the team can't always rely on its defense to bail out its halfcourt offense. On Thursday, Williams was asked how he felt the halfcourt offense was coming along.

"Halfcourt offense takes time," Williams said. "It's probably the toughest thing because, I mean, if you just run screen and roll plays like I've seen on a couple games, unfortunately our players have seen that too, but we do a little more than that, so there's a lot of timing involved and it takes longer. But we can run screen and rolls too. In fact, we might run all screen and roll plays tomorrow night. Because that's what I've been seeing on television, so that must be the way to play."

I'll let you read between the lines on that one, if you so choose.

Okay, I'll admit that was a bit of a tease. The only update is to say that Coach Gary Williams held off Thursday on commenting on Maryland's four-man 2010 recruiting class. The early signing period ended Wednesday.

"I'd really not like to do that today, the day before the game," Williams said. "There still could be some more. We're kind of waiting to see everybody that does sign with us."

Maybe he was waiting for this guy to make his decision public, since the Terrapins have one spot still open in next year's class and were pursuing his services.

That, as you may have clicked and read, did not work out, so there's still one spot left open in the 2010 group. And although point guard Terrell Stoglin and power forward Ashton Pankey have signed their letters of intent, shooting guard Terrence Ross and small forward Mychal Parker (who have given verbal commitments to Maryland) have not yet done so. Or, if they have do so, such actions have not yet been made public.

Regardless, Williams said there will come a time when he will discuss next year's recruiting class. So stay tuned.

I am 7-3 with my predictions this season, and this one is not that hard.

Florida State 31, Maryland 17

It may not be that close. Maryland has yet to score an offensive touchdown without Chris Turner.

What's everyone else think?

Sophomore forward Jin Soo Choi could return to Maryland's lineup Friday night when the Terrapins host New Hampshire at Comcast Center, Coach Gary Williams said Thursday. Choi missed Tuesday's win over Fairfield with a sprained right ankle he suffered four days earlier during Maryland's regular season opener.

"I’m hoping he will be" able to play Friday night, Williams said of Choi. "He ran straight forward yesterday. If he can get involved in practice today, yes, he’ll play."

Williams also said sophomore forward Steve Goins participated in practice Wednesday and is progressing with his lingering knee injury. Goins underwent surgery on the knee in August and had been unable to workout with the team in recent weeks due to persistent discomfort. Goins sat out both of Maryland's regular season games, as well as its exhibition contest Nov. 3.

"I talked to (Goins) this morning and the big thing you find out after you’re on the court is, in his case, 'How did the knee react?'" Williams said. "He says he’s going to practice today. So that’s good. We can use a big body ... He’s done some things in practice, but it’s always the knee flares up as a result of whatever he does. Hopefully, he’s a little further along in his rehab."

Junior forward Dino Gregory is expected to return to the Maryland lineup Dec. 12, according to Coach Gary Wiliiams, who spoke with reporters in a typical day-before-game media availability Thursday. Gregory has missed the first two regular season games, as well as the team's exhibition contest Nov. 3, becasue of what Maryland described as an unspecified violation of team rules.

The last day of the fall semester of classes at Maryland is Dec. 11. On Dec. 12, Maryland hosts Eastern Kentucky at Comcast Center. The nature of the rules violation has not been explained, and Williams declined to speak further on Gregory's situation Thursday. An athletic department official declined to elaborate on Gregory's suspension or on the significance of Gregory's return date.

In August, Gregory acknowledged that his eligibility for the upcoming season was in question because of a charge of academic dishonesty. It is not known whether the academic charge Gregory acknowledged this summer and his current suspension are related.

In an interview with the Diamondback, Maryland's student publication, Wednesday night, Williams declined to address Gregory's situation and said, "I'm still discussing some things with the university."

When asked by reporters Thursday why Williams would need to discuss a team-mandated suspension with the university, the athletic department official declined to comment.

"I expect Dino Gregory to be ready to play Dec. 12," Williams said Thursday during the media availability. "I believe we play Eastern Kentucky. As you probably know, Dino’s been practicing with us, and a big part of the reason for the development of [freshmen forwards] Jordan [Williams] and James [Padgett] has been Dino’s efforts, and I think that tells you somewhat of Dino’s character as a person, in that they both play kind of his position, and his willingness to work with them to help our team during this time has been tremendous. But it’s nothing that I didn’t expect knowing Dino these last couple of years. So we look forward to having Dino at that time."

Here are some links to check out this morning:

Florida's governor wants Bobby Bowden back as FSU's coach next season.

Noted handler Terrelle Woody and South Florida in hot water over possible NCAA violations.

More on the comments from Bowden's wife.

The biggest adjustment New Hampshire Coach Bill Herrion believes his players will have to make Friday night when the Wildcats take on No. 25 Maryland at Comcast Center is the playing venue. New Hampshire, an America East squad that finished 14-16 last season, returns three key contributors and employs a motion offense to go along with its man-to-man defense. The Wildcats are off to a 1-0 start after beating Division III Suffolk, 91-45, at home on Saturday, but Herrion is well aware of the stark contrast in opposition (and in environment) his team will face tomorrow night.

"We fully understand coming down on Friday what we're going to be up against," said Herrion, in his fifth season at New Hampshire. "It's going to be a challenging, new thing for our kids. We play in a 2,000-seat gym and we had 720 people at our first home game the other night, so coming down there and playing in front of 17,000 on Friday night is going to be a really big challenge for our kids, just to see how they handle playing in that kind of atmosphere."

Among New Hampshire's more experienced players are junior guards Alvin Abreu and Tyrone Conley. Abreu (6 feet 2, 188 pounds) averaged 12.8 points per game last season and tallied a team-high 32 steals. Conley (6-2, 200 pounds) averaged 8.9 points per game last season and is more known for his defensive proficiency.

"When they came in as freshmen two years ago, we had kind of torn the program down and really started from scratch," Herrion said. "Tyrone Conley, Alvin Abreu and our big kid, Dane DiLiegro, they came in as freshmen and started from day one. Alvin and Tyrone are our best perimeter players, our leading returning scorers on the perimeter. What we need from them is they've got to become more consistent offensively, more go-to guys and give us more production on the offensive end of the floor."

By the time Tuesday night’s 29-point Maryland win was complete, Fairfield Coach Ed Cooley had figured out all the components of the equation that doomed his squad.

“Twenty-five turnovers, that’s the game,” said Cooley, who formerly served as an assistant under Al Skinner at Boston College. “You’ve got to credit Maryland. They had a lot of run-outs and made some timely threes. They had 16 offensive rebounds. Offensive rebounds, turnovers on the road for an inexperienced team equals blowout.”

Yep, that sounds about right. Maryland Coach Gary Williams said the Terrapins’ defense kept them in the game early on last night when the offense was lagging. Fairfield struggled – as most teams do – to handle Maryland’s variety of presses and turned the ball over five times in its first six possessions. The Stags’ plethora of turnovers led to an abundance of Maryland transition points, which is not an ideal source of sustenance but one that will do for now.

Also encouraging for the Terrapins was that they won the rebounding battle, 41-36, despite missing three of its frontcourt options. Senior forward Landon Milbourne led the way with eight rebounds, while freshmen forwards James Padgett (seven) and Jordan Williams (five) did their part as well. Milbourne and Padgett combined to pull down nine of Maryland’s 16 offensive rebounds.

Senior guard Eric Hayes insists that he, too, was capable of losing his cool, that he was not impervious to outward emotion, as others have made him out to be. No, he’s never drawn a technical foul, at least not that he can remember. He’s never thrown a tantrum on the court, never vented his frustration for any basketball audience to see.

But he claimed after last night’s game that he can become unraveled at times, in his own discreet way. Following a win over Fairfield in which Hayes steadied the Terrapins offensively during a sluggish first half, Coach Gary Williams lauded Hayes for looking “very calm when things weren’t calm” around him. Calm, it seems, is Hayes’s default setting.

“I try to stay patient and see what the defense is doing,” Hayes said. “I kind of figured it out toward the end (of the first half) that they were switching from 2-3 (zone defense) and once we got the ball and made the first pass, they were matching up, so I was just trying to figure out what they were doing and how I could get into the seems of the defense and get to the basket or find an open spot where I could take an open shot.”

Maryland missed 8 of its first 11 shots and trailed Fairfield more than 10 minutes into the game before embarking on a 15-0 run. Hayes tallied 10 first half points and helped propel the Terrapins en route to a sizable victory.