The University of Maine women’s basketball team will finish up their non-conference schedule this weekend and prepare for league play for the rest of the regular season, while the men’s team finishes up next Wednesday. Meanwhile, the men’s ice hockey team also finishes up a four game stretch of non-league opponents before heading back into Hockey East for the final 16 games.
The men’s hockey team has been off since dropping an exhibition contest to the USA Under 18 Development Team in Michigan back on December 8. Maine heads to Princeton, New Jersey Friday and Saturday to battle the Princeton Tigers for 7 pm contests. Maine is 5-7-2 overall. After the matchups with Princeton, the Black Bears will finish up non-conference when they host Colorado College at the Alfond Wednesday night at 6 pm, and then host Yale on Monday, January 7 in Portland. The final 16 games will all be within Hockey East, with 10 of those at home. Maine sits in seventh place in the league with eight points at 3-3-2, but has 4-6 games at hand with the top five teams in the standings who have played between 12-14 league games already. The women’s ice hockey team has all league games left on their schedule, 15 in all with seven those at home. Maine takes their overall record of 11-7-1, 4-7-1 in Hockey East into the two game home series with BU Saturday and Sunday, January 5th and 6th. The Bears are in a three way tie with UConn and UNH for sixth in the league standings.
The men’s basketball team plays at Rutgers on Saturday, and at Brown next Wednesday before opening up the 16 game America East schedule against UMBC on the road next Saturday, January 5. Maine (2-11) has played four overtime games during their non-conference schedule against North Texas, Saint Peters, Fordham, and Central Connecticut State. The Bears are 1-3 in those games with their only win coming over Fordham. In their last outing, Maine is coming off a tough double overtime loss at home last weekend against Central Connecticut State.
The women’s basketball team finishes up non-conference play this weekend as they head to Fordham to participate in the Fordham Holiday Classic. Maine (7-4) will play the host Rams in the Bronx, New York on Saturday at 1 pm trying to break a two game losing streak, then will face either Chattanooga or Middle Tennessee State on Sunday. America East play begins at home next Wednesday night against UNH. The Bears had a very successful portion of the non-conference schedule no matter how they finish at Fordham over the weekend. Maine played Duke at home right down to the end at home on November 15 before falling 66-63, and the Bears have wins over Toledo, Bryant, NC A&T, Penn, North Carolina, Harvard, and Brown. The most impressive of those wins was at North Carolina where they lead by as many as 21 on the Tarheels floor, and took a 12 point win. The other three losses came to Wisconsin-Green Bay, #9 North Carolina State, and Northeastern.
