The Quinnipiac University Bobcats may have graduated four of their top five scorers off last year’s 21-9 team, but it didn’t matter on Monday night.
The Bobcats shot 50.9 percent from the floor including a 6-for-13 showing from beyond the 3-point arc, running their record to 4-0 against the University of Maine’s Black Bears with a season-opening 70-57 victory at the M&T Bank Arena in Hamden, Connecticut.
Six-foot-three freshman forward/center Anna Foley made an impressive college debut, scoring a game-high 21 points, grabbing five rebounds, dishing out four assists and blocking two shots.
Junior guard and captain Jackie Grisdale, the only returning full-time starter, contributed 17 points and two assists; sophomore forward Ella O’Donnell produced 16 points, five rebounds and two assists and freshman guard Karson Martin chipped in with nine points and four assists.
O’Donnell started half the games last year and was chosen to the All-Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference Rookie Team.
Foley shot 9-for-16 from the floor, O’Donnell was 5-for-9 and Grisdale was 6-for-11 including a 4-for-8 performance from long distance.
Graduate student guard Anne Simon paced UMaine with 11 points and six rebounds; junior forward Adrianna Smith had 10 points and a game-high nine rebounds along with three assists and sophomore guard Sarah Talon had 10 points and four rebounds.
Junior guard Sera Hodgson finished with nine points.
Senior Caroline Bornemann had six points and six rebounds and freshman forward Caroline Dotsey had four points and six rebounds in 11 minutes during her college debut.
UMaine shot just 35.8 percent from the floor and a dismal 16 percent beyond the 3-point arc.
Smith, the 2022-23 America East Player of the Year, and Simon, the 2021-22 AE Player of the Year and Defensive Player of the Year, fouled out in the fourth quarter. Each shot 33 percent from the field.
The hosts broke the game open with a 14-0 run at the end of the third quarter to build a 14-point lead and UMaine never recovered.
Simon’s layup tied it 40-40 with 5:06 left in the third before the Bobcats began their decisive run.
Quinnipiac made their last seven shots of the period, three apiece by Foley and O’Donnell, while UMaine went 0-for-5 during that span and turned the ball over three times.
Talon hit a free throw at the end of the quarter to end the scoreless drought.
“They really hurt us with their threes and you’re not going to win any games if you shoot 16 percent for your threes,” said UMaine head coach Amy Vachon to Black Bear Sports Properties/Van Wagner play-by-play man Don Shields after the game.
“We couldn’t get any stops. We have to be better, defensively. Seventy points is too many,” Vachon added. “And you can’t have your two best players foul out.”
“They shot 50 percent from the floor and 47 percent beyond the [3-point] arc. They deserved to win,” said Vachon. “We will be better, offensively.”
UMaine will travel to Philadelphia to take on LaSalle University on Thursday at 4:30 before returning to Orono to play UMass on Sunday at 1 in its home opener at the Memorial Gym.
Quinnipiac will visit Harvard for a 2 p.m. game on Sunday.
