ORONO – Okay, so Saturday afternoon’s “big” matchup between North Atlantic Conference women basketball co-leaders Maine and Vermont turned out to be nothing more than a big washout, an 82-55 mauling of the Catamounts by the host Black Bears.

While the foul-plagued (47 fouls were called) blowout proved to be as exciting as last year’s Super Bowl, Coach Trish Roberts’ team did prove two things to the 1,738 fans inside the Memorial Gymnasium here: The Black Bears are, by far, the class of the NAC. In posting a 5-0 conference record, Maine has beaten every NAC comer by an average margin of 25.2 points per game. And stopping senior center and All-America candidate Rachel Bouchard no longer matters in the NAC. Twice, Maine has played without Bouchard and won handily. Against Vermont, Bouchard sat for 12 minutes and Maine lost nothing after she went to the bench. Instead of looking inside, they turned the game into a track meet and ran the Catamounts off the floor. At one point, with eight minutes remaining in the game, the Black Bears found themselves with a 5-on-1 fast break against the winded Cats.

Maine, 11-5 overall, won its eighth straight while Vermont slipped to 14-3 (4-1 NAC).

“Vermont took it right to us in the first couple of minutes,” Bouchard said. “We had to buckle down on defense. Usually, our defense carries over into our offense. Basically, once we get the flow going, we’re tough to beat.”

After overcoming a slow start (Vermont led 9-7 with 12:02 left), Maine grabbed a 28-25 lead with 2:55 remaining. Bouchard converted on one of her own misses and, following a turnover, took a Carrie Goodhue pass and connected on a fast break to give Maine a 32-25 lead with 52 seconds left in the half.

After a Vermont miss, Bouchard got the rebound and led the break, hitting Julie Bradstreet (8 points, 9 rebounds, 7 assists, 3 steals) for a pull-up 10-foot jumper with 11 seconds left.

Bouchard, after missing two games with a virus, returned to the Black Bear lineup in typical form by finishing with 29 points, 12 rebounds, 3 blocks. Twelve of those points came in the last 10 minutes of the first half to help Maine take a 34-25 lead into the locker room at halftime.

“Maine is obviously a good team. There is no holding back on that,” said Vermont Coach Cathy Inglese. “I thought we did a real nice job in the first half playing defense and limiting them to one shot. We just weren’t ready to play in the second half. We let the game overpower us. We’d never had a team beat us like that just coming down the floor.”

In the second half, it was the play of guards Chris Strong, Goodhue, and Bradstreet which proved key. Pressing UVM’s guards all over the floor, Maine caused 13 second-half turnovers to kick-start its running game and cruise down the stretch.

Strong (15 points, 7 assists) hit a 12-footer and a fast-break layup to open the second half, giving Maine a 38-25 lead.

Vermont’s Jennifer Niebling (24 points) then sandwiched hoops around a post-up bucket from Bouchard before Maine went on an 8-3 run to push the lead to 44-30 with 15:51 left.

Five minutes later the lead was up to 59-38 and five minutes after that it was 70-46, Maine. The Black Bears’ last 12 points came from the free throw line as Maine went 12 for 12 down the stretch.

Missy Kelsen had 15 points for Vermont while Sharon Bay had 9 points and 8 rebounds. Kelsen and Bay are both from Portland.

Black Bears 82, Vermont 55

Maine women Vermont

Name AG G AF F TP Name AG G AF F TP

Strong 9 4 6 6 15 Marsland 4 2 1 0 4

Frenette 6 3 2 2 8 Marra 1 0 0 0 0

Briggs 7 3 3 1 7 Kelsen 18 6 5 2 15

Goodhue 7 3 0 0 7 Niebling 19 8 8 5 24

Carpenter 8 2 4 4 8 Bay 9 3 5 3 9

Bradstreet 5 2 7 4 8 McCarthy 1 0 2 1 1

Bouchard 20 12 7 5 29 Blue 5 1 1 0 2

Buetow 1 0 0 0 0 Wright 0 0 0 0 0

Totals 63 29 29 22 82 Totals 57 20 22 11 55

Maine 34 82

Vermont 25 55

3-pt. goals: Maine (2-5): Strong 1-1, Goodhue 1-2, Bradstreet 0-2; Vermont (4-14): Niebling 3-9, Kelsen 1-5.