The University of Maine’s women’s basketball fell 68-49 in Saturday’s exhibition game against Stonehill College at the Cross Insurance Center in Bangor. The team trotted out many new faces, with five freshmen seeing play time. First-year guard Dor Saar lead the way for the rookies, notching eight points and five rebounds in 33 minutes of play. The Israel native led all players in minutes played.
Returning second-years forward Fanny Wadling and guard Blanca Millan lead the scoring efforts for Maine, each scoring nine points respectively. Second-year guard Julie Brosseau and third-year guard Maddy McVicar each chipped in seven to the effort.
Fourth-year guard Kelly Martin of the Skyhawks lead the way with 24 points and 10 rebounds.
The Skyhawks were able to slowly build their lead, outscoring Maine in each quarter, and leading by as many as 22 points late in the fourth. Stonehill held the advantage in shooting percentage 43.6 to 35.6, and also connected on seven of 18 three pointers.
The first half proved to be the stronger one for Maine. They tied the game early in the second quarter, and played solid, but ultimately found themselves trailing by 12 in the second. The third quarter was the team’s highest scoring output in the game. They scored 16 to Stonehill’s 19. The team was outscored in every quarter of the game.
Maine’s biggest issues came from behind the three point line and the free throw line. The Black Bears were just 3 of 17 from beyond the arc, including missing each of the 11 that they attempted in the first half. From the charity stripe, they were an abysmal 4 for 10. They will need to clean up their shooting from these two areas in order to compete.
Despite the loss, Maine did a good job making sure that young players got experience on the floor. The team is rather young, with only two fourth-year players on the roster. The team will also be looking for someone to step up, with Sigi Koizar, the team’s leading scorer last season, having graduated. Millan had a strong rookie campaign, averaging eight points a game, which was good for third on the team. She was also named to the America East All-Rookie Team.
The team will look to try and match last year’s success, where they made a run all the way to the conference title game, eventually falling to the University of Albany 66-50. The team upset their rival University of New Hampshire, the No. 1 seed in the tournament, on the way there.
The Black Bears will officially kickoff the regular season on Nov. 10 where they will host Tulane. Tip off is set for 6 p.m. at the Memorial Gym. Stonehill will go on to play again on Nov. 15 at Bentley with a tip-off at 5:30 p.m.
