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The University of Maine men’s basketball team handled Cape Breton University in their first exhibition game at Alfond Arena 72-57.
The Black Bears muscled the Capers on the boards, out-rebounding Cape Breton 50-27.
Also apparent in the early season exhibition was the lack of ball control for the Black Bears, turning the ball over 21 times in the game.
“[We’ve] got to do a much better job of taking care of the basketball,” head coach Ted Woodward said. “That’s something we talk about all the time and part of it is just getting out in these sequences and playing basketball.”
The Black Bears jumped out to the early lead, going up 10 on a 3-pointer from junior guard Gerald McLemore early on against the Capers. McLemore led the Black Bears in scoring with 14 points on the afternoon and going 4-9 from 3-point range.
The Capers narrowed the deficit to five, until UMaine broke off on a 12-3 run capped off by back-to-back threes by junior guards Andrew Rogers and McLemore.
The Black Bears continued to get the advantage down low in the first half, picking up second chance points to head into halftime with the 40-24 lead.
The Black Bears outscored the Capers 12-0 in the second-chance department, and had just one less offensive rebound than Cape Breton had total rebounds in the first half.
“We got a lot of long guys on our team,” senior forward Troy Barnies said. “We try to take advantage of that.”
“That’s a huge focus of ours,” Woodward added. “Rebounds and turnovers are two things we really want to be strong at.”
The Capers were able to cut the lead down to 10 early in the second half, but a three by junior guard Raheem Singleton expanded the lead to 13.
Five minutes into the second half, senior forward Sean McNally limped to the sideline with an apparent ankle injury. Walking off on his own power, albeit gingerly, McNally didn’t return.
“As far as I know it’s just a roll,” Woodward said. “We could have put him back in the game but there was no use in doing that.”
For the majority of the second half, both teams exchanged baskets as Cape Breton failed to get any closer than nine points of the Black Bears, with the final buzzer sounding the Black Bear victory.
The Black Bears didn’t get nearly as many shots off in the second half, but made more of the opportunities they did receive, shooting 44 percent in the second half and 57 percent from three. For the game, the Black Bears shot 40 percent from the field.
The Capers didn’t fare nearly as well from the field, shooting a lowly 37 percent and just 23 percent from 3-point range, going 7-30.
“Today’s goal was to execute,” Barnies said. “Offensively, we wanted to work out all of our plays. Defensively, we wanted to shut them under 40 percent shooting. Every game we go into we want to hold every team to 40 percent on field goals. We did a good job defensively; offensively we have a long way to go.”
Bangor Daily News