When a juggernaut team coming off a Final Four appearance faces a struggling team, the ending result often leaves little room for imagination.

That held true Thursday night at the Kohl Center, as the University of Wisconsin women’s basketball team fell 81-70 to the Maryland Terrapins in the two teams’ first matchup as conference opponents.

With the win, Maryland clinched the regular season Big Ten title in their first season in the conference.

The Terrapins (24-2, 15-0 Big Ten) led for the entire 40 minutes of the contest, with their leads stretching as far as 19 and as close as three. The only time Wisconsin (8-17, 4-11 Big Ten) threatened was at the start of the second half, when they went on a 16-6 run out of halftime to cut the lead to 49-46.

That would be the closest the Badgers got.

“I thought we fought back hard,” junior guard Tessa Cichy said. “We usually don’t start the second half very well, but we came out kind of guns blazing and got it down to three. We’re kind of a battle back team, that’s just what we do.”

The Terrapins kept feeding sophomore center Brionna Jones down low, and the Badgers didn’t do themselves any favors by only scoring six points in six minutes and 58 seconds in the middle of the second half. They were 1-7 from the field during that stretch, a Bauman three-pointer, while turning it over twice, and the drought resulted in a 20-3 run for Maryland.

“Ups and downs, that’s just how basketball goes,” Cichy said. “We had our stretch, they had their stretch, it’s just about not letting their stretch outscore our stretch.”

Jones had seven points in that span for Maryland. Wisconsin head coach Bobbie Kelsey said her team was able to tame Jones in the first-half, but then Maryland started hitting their shots, forcing Kelsey to eliminate a low-post double-team on Jones from the gameplan.

“She’s a big girl. She’s a big, strong woman,” Kelsey said of Jones. “… She used her body well. That’s a weapon for them.

“And then they have good shooters. So if you come off a shooter, you give up a three instead of a two.”

Each team displayed balanced scoring attacks, with both teams having three starters in double figures. Jones, and sophomore guards Shatori Walker-Kimbrough (17) and Lexie Brown (15) led the Terrapins, while junior guards Cichy (a team-high 17), Nicole Bauman (16) and Dakota Whyte (16) led the Badgers.

As has been the case all season, and particularly during Big Ten play, the defensive effort from the Badgers created an uphill battle for UW. Getting down 21-6 in the first 7:27 of the game didn’t help much either, Bauman said.

“We can’t dig a hole that [big],” Bauman said. “That obviously hurt us, even though it was in the beginning of the game.”

Wisconsin’s offense got them back into it once again, going on a 6-0 run to cut the lead to 71-60. A Bauman put-back layup with 41 seconds remaining in the game to make it 77-69 was the closest the Badgers got.

“I thought Wisconsin did a great job just competing for 40 minutes,” Maryland head coach Brenda Frese said. “They really scrapped, I thought they were really aggressive and I thought we played hard in spurts, had our stretches where we were able to break it open.”

As a team, Maryland shot 49.2 percent from the floor, while Wisconsin shot 45.2 percent. Maryland was 3-9 from behind the arc, while Wisconsin was 7-22 (31.8 percent).

“A couple of shots go in, it might be a different game … you just gotta knock them down,” Kelsey said.

Maryland edged Wisconsin in nearly every other aspect of the game. The Terrapins had 36 paint points compared to Wisconsin’s 28 and 19 second-chance points, while UW had 13. The Terrapins out-rebounded Wisconsin 37-34, with each team hauling in 13 offensive rebounds.

Maryland was able to capitalize on Wisconsin’s 11 first-half turnovers, translating that into 20 points, with eight coming on the fast break. They finished with 28 points off of 15 Wisconsin turnovers.

And despite the outcome, Kelsey said the Badgers are able to take away some positives from the game.

“We don’t like the moral victories, but again, you have to take the positives from losses, as well as when you win you can’t have a different mindset when you lose the game,” Kelsey said. “Obviously you’re not happy about losing but these kids are fighters and I thought they played a little bit more confident tonight.”

The game was the first time Maryland and Wisconsin had met in over 33 years. Maryland won the first matchup between the two teams, on Jan. 5, 1982, 91-62 in College Park, Maryland.

The Badgers final home game of the season, and Senior Day, is Sunday at 3 p.m. at home against Northwestern.