Maine Men Down UMBC 81-66 to Win 4th in a Row

UMaine Men moved to 2-0 and first place in the conference by themselves for the time being right this very minute as other games are still being played.

Hartford beat BU and Vermont was beating Albany by 9 as I posted this Blog. So Maine will be tied for first place with Hartford and the winner of the Vermont-Albany game.

Maine did the things they needed to as they committed only 12 personal fouls and only took 7 3’s of which the made 4 for 57.1%.

They shot over 50% at 58% for the game which is outstanding. Maine took advantage of their height and got the ball inside as they only took 7 3 attempts which meant that UMBC was not doubling down on Fraser in the Paint.

Maine led by as much as 10 during the 2nd half only to have UMBC cut the lead to 3 64-61, but MMaine responded by outscorng UMBC 17 to 5 to seal the win.

Maine had excellent balance as they had 5 players in double figures and they did an excellent job defensively of holding down Cook of UMBC who was the 2nd leading scorer in the conference going into the game. He was held to just 10 points.

UMBC committed 21 fouls and Maine shot 15 for 23 at 65.7% and that was the difference in the game, keeping UMBC off the foul line as UMBC shot just 7 of 10 for 70%.

Maine also had 21 assists of the 31 field goals that they made and UMBC had just 11 assists.

UMBC committed 12 Tournovers to UMaines 18.

Maine’s 3 point defense has also improved as UMBC only got 15 off and made 5 for 33.3%.

Encouraging that UMaine has only committed 7 and 12 personal fouls in their last 2 games, as they had been averaging 20 plus per game prior .

Also, Mane got the ball inside more as shown by them only having to attempt 7 3’s for the entire game.

Good win for the Black Bears who now go to 6-8 overall and head on the road next to Face Hartford and Albany.

These next tow games should be excellent proving points for the Black Bears in their future Conference play.