ORONO – For the past month, Errick Greene has gone home each night to an apartment filled with battered Black Bears.

While Greene had escaped a Thanksgiving weekend car crash with bruises and scrapes, his roommates – UMaine basketball starters Clayton Brown and Derrick Jackson – weren’t so lucky.

On Sunday, Brown and Jackson finally returned to the UMaine lineup to face Ivy League power Brown University.

They made up for lost time, and were key components in an 89-76 win over Brown in front of 2,113 fans at Alfond Arena. UMaine improved to 3-8 and will play the rest of its games against America East competition. Brown, which has wins over Rhode Island, Providence along with three America East teams to its credit, dropped to 7-3.

“Those my boys. Them my fellas,” Greene said with a grin after tossing in 30 points, handing out four assists and grabbing six rebounds in over the course of a 40-minute afternoon.

“It was just good to see them out there. We’re a little deeper,” Greene said.

Among Greene’s hoops were two buckets on which he inbounded the ball off an opponent’s back, picked up the carom and scored uncontested layups.

Clayton Brown showed no sign of the broken shooting wrist that had sidelined him, scoring 28 points on 8-for-10 shooting from the floor and 9-for-10 accuracy from the line. He also grabbed nine rebounds.

UMaine coach John Giannini said the effort was a breakout game for Brown, who hadn’t completely lived up to expectations before his injury.

“I told a lot of people that Clayton could be the best power forward in our conference and for a little while, I did not look like the most intelligent coach,” Giannini said. “Today I look a little bit smarter.”

Brown said that after listening to Giannini’s heated practice rhetoric for the past five weeks, he was ready to play.

“After hearing that over and over, every day, and him getting mad that we’re not [doing the little things], you just want to go out there and do something about it,” Brown said.

Freshman Joe Campbell of Bangor added 11 points and four rebounds in 36 minutes of action while Justin Rowe and Jackson scored eight apiece. The 7-foot Rowe had four rebounds.

The Black Bears trailed by as much as seven points in the first half before coming back and trailing by a point at the break.

And in the second half, they picked Brown apart, connecting on 15 of 22 attempts from the floor and holding Brown scoreless for a crucial 4:45 span late in the game.

When Brown’s Alaivaa Nuualiitia completed a conventional three-point play with 6:04 to play, the game was tied at 65-65.

But the Black Bears reeled off 11 straight points after that over the next 4:45 to take a 76-65 lead and made 15 of 16 free throw attempts over the final 1:24 to ice the game.

Brown coach Glen Miller was disappointed in his team’s effort.

“We were absolutely atrocious on defense,” Miller said. “To give up 68 percent shooting in a half, you can’t expect to win. I’m very, very displeased with our intensity and our lack of effort defensively.”

Another key to the game: UMaine held the Ivy League’s top scorer, junior Earl Hunt, to just four points on a 1-for-9 shooting performance.

Brown got 24 points from Nuualiitia and 18 from freshman Jason Forte, the younger brother of Boston Celtics guard Joseph Forte. Josh Meyer added 14.

BLACK BEARS 89, BROWN BEARS 76

Brown (7-3) Maine (3-8)

Player G AG F AF TP Player G AG AF TP

Martin 3 8 0 1 9 Greene 11 16 10 30

Ware 1 4 0 0 2 Campbell 4 9 11

Hunt 1 9 2 4 4 Jackson 1 4 6 8

Nuuliitia 9 15 4 6 24 White 1 7 4

Kilburn 1 4 0 0 2 Rowe 3 3 8

King 0 0 0 0 0 Petkus 0 1 0 0

Forte 9 20 0 1 18 Tibbetts 0 0

Etheridge 1 1 0 0 3 Dubois 0 0 0

Howard 0 0 0 0 0 Brown 8 10 10 28

Eads 0 2 0 0 0

Meyer 4 6 2 2 14

Totals 29 69 8 14 76 Totals 28 50 28 35 89

Brown 39 76

Maine 38 89

3-pt. goals: Brown (10-23): Martin 3-8, Hunt 0-3, Nuualiitia 2-4, Forte 0-1, Etheridge 1-1, Meyer 4-6; Maine (5-8): Greene 1-1, Campbell 1-1, Jackson 0-2, Petkus 0-1, Brown 3-3

Attendance: 2,113