Women's Basketball Returns to the Hatter Classic
12/15/2010 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Game Notes
ORONO, Maine – The Maine women's basketball team (1-8) returns to the Hatter Classic in Deland, Fla. for the third time in its history. The Black Bears traveled to the Stetson-hosted tournament in 1989 and 2001 and are undefeated at the J. Ollie Edmunds Center. UMaine will face Winthrop at 3:30 p.m. on Monday and Stetson at 1 p.m. on Tuesday.
Maine dropped a pair of games in the state of Pennsylvania last week. The Black Bears fell to Penn 69-48 last Friday and 95-41 at Penn State on Sunday.
Amber Smith (Ipswich, Mass./Ipswich) scored in double figures for the third-straight time against Penn State. She opened the season with four 10+ scoring performances and has scored in double digits seven times this year. Shareka Maner (Spring Hill, Fla./Nature Coast) made her career debut at Penn and played against Penn State as well, while Corinne Wellington (Rochester, N.Y./Wilson Magnet) pulled down a career-high 11 boards at Penn State.
The America East selected Smith as the Rookie of the week for the second time this season after she led the team with 12.5 points per game last week. It is also the third such selection in a row for the Maine women's basketball team. Ashleigh Roberts (Wilmington, Del./Concord) was select Rookie of the Week for week #4, with Smith receiving the award in weeks #3 and 5. Smith became the fastest Black Bear to reach 100 career points since Samantha Baranowski (Stanhope, N.J./Lenape Valley Regional) scored 100 in 11 games in 2008-09. Smith drained her 100th point on the final basket at Penn Friday. The game was also her 11th career contest.
Maine ranks among the top-five offenses in the league with 56 points per game and is third in the conference from the charity stripe with a .701 mark. Amber Smith leads all freshman with 12.4 points per game and a .444 field-goal percentage. She ranks in the top-10 in both categories in the America East. The Black Bears also lead the conference in average attendance with 1,376 fans a game.
Winthrop currently sits at 2-6 on the season with wins over Davidson and North Carolina Central. The Eagles rank 93rd in the NCAA in scoring defense and have held their oppenents to under 60 points a contest. They also stand at 60th in the nation with 11.3 steals a game.
Winthrop is coming off a 53-16 loss to Southern Poly State on Sunday. The Eagles were held to their lowest-scoring output of the season and made only six field goals in the game. Winthrop also dropped a tough 53-48 decision to Virginia Tech on December 5th. The Hokies scored 20 points off of Eagle turnovers and drained 12 second-chance points to get their fifth win of the season.
Dequesha McClanahan leads the team with 9.8 points, 3 assists and 3.1 steals per game. TaQuoia Hammick leads the Eagles' rebounding effort with 6.4 a game.
Maine and Winthrop have never faced each other. The Black Bears have also never faced an opponent from the Big South conference. The Big South consists of 10 schools from three states; North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia. The member institutions are Charleston Southern, Coastal Carolina, Gardner-Webb, High Point, Liberty, Presbyterian, Radford, UNC Asheville, VMI and Winthrop.
Despite Maine having never played a team from the Big South, the America East has ties to the Big South conference. Stony Brook is an associate member of the conference for the sport of football, while UMBC was a member of the league from 1992 to 1998.
Stetson enters the Hatter Classic with a 3-5, 1-1 record on the season. The Hatters have defeated Saint Leo, Jacksonville State and North Florida this year. They have allowed 52 or fewer points in two of their three win, but have allowed 70 points or more in four of their five losses. Stetson is averaging 61.4 points per game and has two players in double figures for the season.
The Hatters will play host to the Hatter Classic following a 54-49 loss to Georgia Southern Tuesday. The Eagles picked up their second win of the season behind accurate free-throw shooting. Stetson was led by Tierra Brown's 15 points and Natasha Graboski's 15 rebounds. The Hatters led 27-23 at halftime, but were outscored 31-22 in the second half.
Victoria McGowan leads the Hatters with 13.0 points, 3.3 assists and 3 steals a game. Sasha Sims is also scoring in double figures with 11.1 a contest.
Maine has traveled to the Hatter Classic twice before and is undefeated at the J. Ollie Edmunds Center in Deland, Fla. The Black Bears faced Stetson in both those trips and won 86-78 in 1989 and 75-57 in 2001. UMaine went to overtime in both games in the 1989 Hatter Classic and defeated Holy Cross 83-81 to go along with their win over the host school. Maine also won the other game in 2001 71-54 over Georgia Southern.
The Black Bears are 4-0 against teams from the A-Sun but have only faced three squads. Maine has faced Stetson twice and Mercer and Kennesaw State once each. The Atlantic Sun conference consists of Belmont, Campbell, East Tenn. State, Florida Gulf Coast, Jacksonville, Kennesaw State, Lipscomb, Mercer, North Florida, Stetson and USC Upstate.
For fans who cannot make it to the games, Don Shields will provide radio play-by-play on the Black Bear Sports Network starting 30 minutes prior to tip-off of both games. The games can be heard on either WAEI-FM 97.1, WAEI 910 AM or GoBlackBears.com, while live stats will be available on GoHatters.com(.)
