ORONO, Maine - The University of Maine men's basketball program takes the floor on Wednesday night for their 2019-20 season opener, as Head Coach Richard Barron leads the Black Bears in his second season at the helm with one of the youngest rosters in the conference ready to take the next step forward as a program.
Then 2018-19 season provided plenty of growing pains for the Black Bears in Barron's first season with the men's team, with Maine posting a 5-27 overall record with a 3-13 mark in America East play. The team qualified for the conference tournament but was bounced in the first round by the omnipresent squad from Vermont who would go on to win the tournament as the #1 overall seed.
This year looks to be a more compelling season in a lot of ways, especially with Maine's packed non-conference schedule. The Black Bears will take on Merrimack to open the season in the former Division II juggernaut's first season in Division I, before heading south to take on Harvard, their first of three Ivy League opponents this season.
Then the fun really begins in earnest, with a trip to the Pacific Northwest to take on Portland and Washington on November 16th and 19th. After a visit to Portland, Maine to take on Maine Maritime at the Portland Expo, their first contest at the Expo since 2016.
The stoutest road trip of the season begins afterward, with a trip to defending national champion Virginia on November 27th kicking off a four-game road set that includes trips to UConn, Northeastern, and Central Connecticut State.
Maine will finally return home on December 12th and 15th to take on Dartmouth and Quinnipiac at the Cross Insurance Center, but then it's right back on the road for a December 20th date at UMass before a December 29th trip across the big water to the University of Hawai'i. Maine will close out its non-conference slate with a January 2nd contest against Columbia University before entering America East play the rest of the way.
Like previous years, Maine will host and travel to all eight America East schools for a 16-game conference schedule. They'll open things on January 5th against Stony Brook at the Cross Center, and end things on March 3rd at Hartford. The America East Tournament begins on Saturday, March 7th, with all games being played at the home court of the higher seed. The championship game is scheduled to take place on March 14 with an automatic bid for the NCAA Tournament on the line.
Similar to last year, the league is Vermont's to lose. The Catamounts were selected unanimously in the preseason poll to repeat as league champions, but after that things begin to open up league-wide. Maine was picked to finish 8th overall for another season, but with young rosters across the league, it remains to be seen how the cards will fall.
Alongside their preseason poll, the America East released their Preseason All-Conference team, and for the first time since 2012 a Black Bear appeared on the list. Senior co-captain and Maine native Andrew Fleming was named one of six players honored by the conference with the preseason honor. Fresh off becoming the first Black Bear to earn all-conference second team honors since Justin Edwards and Alasdair Fraser were both selected to the second team in the 2012-13 season,
Fleming will look to build on an extraordinary junior season where he led the Black Bears in scoring, rebounding and assists, pouring in 13.8 points per game, while grabbing 7.0 rebounds per contest and distributing 3.1 assists per game. He posted four double-doubles on the season, recording double-figures in 22 of 28 games he appeared in.
Fleming will share leadership responsibilities with classmate and co-captain Sergio El Darwich, who enters his second year as a member of the Black Bears after transferring in from Western Texas a year ago.
El Darwich started 25 games a year ago, shooting 49% from the field and racking up 94 assists, 40 steals, and seven blocks on the season.
The only other returning player with significant game-minutes under his belt comes in the form of junior Vilgot Larsson. Larsson logged 949 total minutes in 29 starts and 32 appearances averaging 6.7 points, 3.8 rebounds and 1.3 assists per game in his first season at UMaine. The other returner with triple-digit minutes is junior
Miks Antoms who recorded 193 minutes in 2018-19, making 26 appearances.
Maine will feature four redshirted players this season, as Mykhailo Yagodin, Solomon Iluyomade, Stephane Ingo, and Nedeljko Prijovic all head into their first full season on the court in Black Bear blue, all looking to log significant minutes for Coach Barron.
Encapsulating the youth movement is the packed freshman class, featuring seven newcomers from five different countries. Ja'Shonté Wright-McLeish, Ata Turgut, Agah Kizilkaya, Taylor Schildroth, Veljko Radakovic, Peter Stumer, and Precious Okoh all bring a wide-ranging set of attributes to the program and will look to make a significant impact in a largely wide-open competition for minutes in the early season.
The first test for the entire men's basketball program will be on Wednesday night, when they host Merrimack College 7:00 PM at the Cross Insurance Center in Bangor. Tickets for all games at the Cross are available here. Tickets to the November 24, 2019 contest at the Portland Expo and the February 1, 2020 Men's game being played at Memorial Gym (The Pit) are available here.
For all the latest news and updates regarding the program, stay tuned to GoBlackBears.com and . the @BlackBearsMBB Instagram and Twitter pages.
