BANGOR, Maine- Tanesha Sutton led three players in double figures on Wednesday night, as the University of Maine rolled past the University of New Hampshire 69-36 in a America East women’s basketball quarterfinal before a crowd of 1,764 at the Cross Insurance Center.
Maine started quickly scoring the first nine points of the game, with the first four from Sutton and then five in a row from conference player of the year Blanca Millan. UNH didn’t score a point until 4:30 into the game, and nine Wildcat turnovers allowed the Black Bears to build a 15 point lead and lead 22-9 after the first 10 minutes. The Black Bears stated the second quarter just 1-10 from the floor, but the defense didn’t allowing visiting UNH to cut too much into the lead. “Defense is a key for us, I feel like if we play D, it can help us to get easy points in transition”, said Maine point guard Dor Saar. UNH did cut it to 11 and 12 points in the quarter, but an 11-3 run to end it before the half had the hosts up 40-20 at the break.
The hosts continued to increase that lead in the second half, building it to 26 in the third quarter behind 10 points from Sutton who ended up also a perfect 10-10 from the foul line. The 33 point margin in the end was the biggest lead of the game for the Bears, who improve their overall record to 23-7 with their 12th consecutive win. UNH finishes up their season at 6-24. Maine took advantage of 21 Wildcat turnovers, committing just four themselves, outscoring UNH 25-0 in points off those errors. Wildcats head coach Maureen Magarity said, “We’re happy to be here, playoffs. It’s been a tough year for us with injuries and just battling through alot of adversity so I am proud of the team for making the playoffs to be honest. We have a young team and I think this was a great experience for us. Obviously we had a really tough matchup. And credit to Maine they have had an incredible season and with our personnel it was really tough to match up with them”.
Sutton finished with a game high 24 points and 12 rebounds for Maine. Millan had 19 points, four rebounds, and three assists. Saar added 10 points and four assists. Kari Brekke led UNH with 11 points. Amanda Torres added nine points and six rebounds, while Alli Gribbin also chipped in seven points and five rebounds. Maine head coach Amy Vachon said, “Really happy with our team. Thought we came out in the first quarter played real well with alot of intensity. We hadn’t played home for a while, so that was nice. I don’t think we shot the ball well tonight, but 19 offensive rebounds and going after the glass. 26 second chance points is really great. And thought our defense was good too. Sometimes you have to win ugly, and in the second half we may of done that, but we will take it and we will be ready for Sunday.”
Maine will now move on to the America East semifinal round on Sunday afternoon at 1 pm when they host the Albany Great Danes. The game will be played at Memorial Gym (the Pit) on the UMaine campus. In Sundays other semifinal, Stony Brook is at Hartford. The two semifinal winners will meet on Friday 3/15 at 5 pm for the America East championship at the highest seeds home court. Maine had two wins over 13-17 Albany in the regular season, winning 76-65 in Bangor on January 12 and 67-61 at Albany on February 16.
