The outlook for the University of Maine women’s basketball team changed when two key players were lost for the season due to knee surgeries.
Adrianna Smith is a two-time All-America East first team selection and the 2022-23 America East Player of the Year and incoming freshman Maddie Fitzpatrick is a two-time Maine schoolgirl Gatorade Player of the Year and was expected to make an immediate impact.
And two-time America East Player of the Year and Defensive Player of the Year Anne Simon has departed.
Through the first 10 games of the season, all non-conference games, the Black Bears have gone 3-7 and have been outscored by nearly 10 points a game (65.8-56.4) and outrebounded 34.1-28.9.
The Black Bears have also averaged 14.7 turnovers, 2.2 more than a year ago, and opponents have shot 46.6 percent from the floor and 35.6 percent beyond the 3-point arc compared to UMaine’s 39.5 and 30.1, respectively.
But their won-loss record in non-conference games is irrelevant as are the stats because the season all boils down to conference play.
America East is a lower-tier mid-major conference which means the only team from the league that is going to earn an NCAA Tournament berth is the conference tournament champion, which earns the automatic berth.
So the Black Bears’ non-conference games are used for preparation for the conference schedule.
“We’re a work in progress,” said Amy Vachon, who is in her eighth full season as the head coach at UMaine and already owns the league record for most America East Coach-of-the-Year honors with five.
“We’ve played a real tough schedule. We’ve learned some things and we’ll see if we can put those lessons into action,” said the Augusta native, who has been inducted into four Halls of Fame.
The seven losses have come against teams that have combined for a 48-18 record.
Five of those teams have already won at least seven games: Harvard (10-1), Quinnipiac (7-1), St. Joseph’s University of Philadelphia (7-2), Indiana (7-3) and the University of Pennsylvania (7-3).
The other losses were to Purdue (5-4), which is a Big Ten school along with Indiana, and Boston University (5-4).
Two of the bright spots for the Black Bears have been Danish point guard and Seattle University transfer Asta Blauenfeldt and sophomore forward Caroline Dotsey.
Junior Blauenfeldt is averaging 7.7 points, 2.5 assists and 1.9 rebounds per game and leads the team in steals with 12.
She has the team’s best shooting percentage from the floor (48.3) and is tied with Dotsey from 3-point range at 41.4 percent.
The 5-foot-6 Blauenfeldt has shot 25-for-43 (58.1 percent) from the floor and 11-for-20 (55 percent) over her last six games and after being turnover-prone early, she has done a much better job protecting the ball of late. She averaged three turnovers a game through her first five and just 1.4 over her last five.
“She brings something to our team that we’ve been missing,” said Vachon referring to the fact that the speedy Blauenfeldt is a pure point guard. “She has had a great couple of games. That’s what we know she can do and hopefully she can be consistent.
“She got off to a slow start but she is getting more comfortable in our system so she has been able to do the things you’ve seen her do the last couple of games,” Vachon added.
The 6-foot-2 Dotsey scored a total of 14 points as Smith’s backup last season and averaged only 3.9 minutes per game.
She has already scored 81 points for an 8.1 points per game average while seeing just 14.8 minutes of playing time per game. And she has averaged 13.2 ppg over her last five games after averaging 3 ppg in her first five. She is also averaging 2.6 rebounds.
Dotsey has hit 11 of her last 25 threes.
“She is still learning. She hardly played last year,” said Vachon. “She has shown some flashes of greatness and flashes that she’s still learning.
“It will be important for those two to continue to learn and to get better every game,” said Vachon.
Athletic 5-foot-10 junior guard Sarah Talon from Windham has shown noticeable improvement, averaging a career-high 9.1 ppg after averaging 6.5 a year ago. She scored at least nine points in six of her first seven games but has cooled off of late, averaging 4 ppg over her last three.
Her rebounding numbers are also up by over a rebound and half (3.9-2.2) over last year. And she has continued to be a solid defender.
Graduate student guard-forward Caroline Bornemann is leading the team in scoring (11.8 ppg) and rebounding (7.4) and has four double-doubles already this year after having just two a year ago when she averaged 7.3 ppg and 5.5 rpg.
She is also dishing out 2.2 assists per game.
She has become a more assertive rebounder and has shot 40.3 percent from the floor. But her 3-point percentage (17.9) needs to improve.
Senior guards Paula Gallego and Sera Hodgson and graduate student guard Olivia Rockwood have more prominent roles this season and it will be important to get consistent contributions from the trio.
Gallego’s minutes have doubled over last year and she has responded by leading the team in assists (3.3 per game) while also averaging 6.9 ppg. She had 2.8 ppg a year ago and 1.5 apg. She has also averaged 3.5 rpg.
Like Blauenfeldt, Gallego had turnover issues early but has committed just eight over her last five games after turning it over 18 times in her first five contests.
Rockwood is a 3-point specialist and has started to heat up. After going just 6-for-22 from long distance her first four games, she has hit 10 of her last 24 threes and that trend needs to continue.
Hodgson continues to be a dependable defender who can also chip in offensively but she has struggled with her shot (29.3 percent from the floor, 29 percent from long distance) so far.
Skowhegan junior Jaycie Christopher could be an important weapon moving forward.
Her 42.5 percent showing from long distance her freshman year was best among Black Bears who took at least 20 threes. But she had gone 28-for-90 (31.1 percent) through last season and the first four games this season before hitting 7 of her last 16 threes which is encouraging.
Senior guard Idan Shlush is a 3-point option off the bench and Veazie sophomore Emmie Streams has already played 45 minutes more than all of last year in a backup point guard role.
Freshmen Izzy Allen from Corinth and Ona Alarcon from Spain have yet to play and transfer Amiyah Donaldson is going to redshirt this season.
Vachon said the stats have been “skewed a little bit by the talent we have been going up against.
“We just need to keep getting better at everything. Hopefully, people can get comfortable in their new roles and we can get back to playing our style of game. We need to keep improving,” said Vachon.
The Black Bears will need to play their usual style of tenacious defense, shoot well and rebound by committee to make a long playoff run.
They aren’t the favorites any more but they have the best coach in the league and they have a winning culture as evidenced by their five league regular season championships and three tourney titles over the past seven years.
So you can’t count them out.
UMaine will host Division III Bates College from Lewiston at 2 p.m. on Saturday, Dec. 21.
