DURHAM, N.H. – Wednesday’s visit to the no-sales-tax state couldn’t have been more taxing for the University of Maine men’s basketball team. For the third time in their last five games, turnovers left them on the short end of the scoreboard.

The New Hampshire Wildcats – possessors of a 1-10 record coming into the America East Conference contest with Maine – used defense and quickness to outhustle the Black Bears and post a 74-64 upset victory at Lundholm Gymnasium.

“I’m usually not at a loss for words, but I am tonight,” said an obviously perplexed and frustrated John Giannini, Maine’s head coach.

It was the third time in their last five games the Bears committed 23 or more turnovers.

Freshman guards Shejdie Childs and Ronnie Dennis scored 17 points apiece.

Junior swingman Griffin Walker led the Wildcats with a career-high 18 points plus eight rebounds.

“Tonight we played like we had nothing to lose,” the 6-foot-4 Walker said.

The Wildcats feasted on Maine miscues with 25 points off 23 UM turnovers in a game they led from start to finish. New Hampshire’s first home win against Maine since January 1998 deprived the Bears of their program’s 800th overall win.

“For the first time this year, we just had some guys look out of place. I’m not even as surprised about the turnovers as I am that we had so many guys play badly,” Giannini said. “I don’t know if I’ve ever had so many guys do that the same night in my 14-year career.”

The result leaves Maine at 6-9 overall and 1-2 in the conference while the young Wildcats are now 1-1 in America East.

Maine made a couple of modest runs to close the double-digit deficit early in the second half, but UNH responded each time.

After UNH hit a 3-pointer to start the second half, Maine scored 10 of the next 12 points to make it a five-point game, but an Ioannis Karalis 3-pointer and another UNH hoop restored the lead to 10 with 14 minutes to play.

Maine responded with a 10-5 run over the next two minutes to again cut UNH’s lead to five, but another 5-0 flurry with a Walker 3-pointer pushed it back to 10.

The Bears could never get closer than six points the rest of the way as UNH shot 7-for-10 from the line in the last 51/2 minutes.

“With this team, some nights we’ll play well and some nights we won’t play well, but teams [opponents] will have to earn it,” said UNH coach Phil Rowe.

Senior forward Rickey White led the Bears with a game-high 24 points, while senior guard Derrick Jackson came off the bench for 10.

Junior guard Marcus Bullock had 15 points plus a career-high eight boards and six steals for the ‘Cats.

Maine outrebounded UNH 45-36 and outshot the ‘Cats 47.5 to 39.7 percent from the field, but the 23-to-8 turnover differential was too much to overcome.

The first half was a frustrating one for the Black Bears, who committed 11 turnovers and shot 41.4 percent from the field. The Wildcats pounced on the Bears for a 7-2 lead in the first three minutes and built a 10-point halftime lead on the strength of their quickness and outside shooting.

“With Rickey in foul trouble, we literally had no one play well in the first half,” Giannini said, shaking his head while re-reading the postgame stat sheet.

Meanwhile, the Wildcats were shooting a modest 44.4 percent from the floor, but capitalized with nine points off UM turnovers.

Despite connecting on only three of 12 attempts from 3-point range, the ‘Cats did well from 12-18 feet away from the hoop and continuously found seams in the Bears’ defense on quick penetration cuts and drives to the hoop.

The Bears had trouble connecting against UNH’s alternating zone defenses. The ‘Cats started out in a 1-3-1 and used 2-3 and 3-2 zone formations to give the Bears different looks. Maine shot just 4-for-19 from 3-point range in the game.

At the same time, the Bears had no defensive answer for UNH guards Walker and Childs, who combined for 22 first-half points and either exposed the Bears’ soft defense in the lanes with their mercurial penetration moves or led the break. The Wildcats scored eight fast-break points to Maine’s four in the first half and 12 to eight overall.

Despite a pronounced height advantage in the frontcourt, Maine was outscored 22-18 in the paint in the first half, but finished with a 40-36 edge in the game.

WILDCATS 74, BLACK BEARS 64

Maine (6-9) New Hampshire (2-10)

Player G AG F AF TP Player G AG AF TP

White 11 15 1 2 24 Walker 8 21 18

Rowe 3 4 3 6 9 Peterson 1 7 2

Dobson 3 8 0 0 7 Childs 8 11 17

Hadjisotirov 1 4 0 0 2 Bullock 5 15 15

Reed 3 10 0 0 8 Dennis 5 10 5 17

Petkus 0 0 0 0 0 Karalis 1 3 3

Hill 0 0 0 0 0 Williams 0 5 0

Leavitt 0 0 0 0 0 Collette 1 2

Campbell 1 7 0 0 2

Jackson 5 8 0 0 10

Brown 1 3 0 0 2

Totals 28 59 4 8 64 Totals 29 73 12 74

Maine 26 64

New Hampshire 36 74

3-pt. goals ? Maine (4-19): White 1-1, Dobson 1-3, Hadjisotirov 0-2, Reed 2-6, Campbell 0-4, Jackson 0-2, Brown 0-1; UNH (8-28): Walker 2-6, Childs 0-1, Bullock 3-13, Dennis 2-4, Karalis 1-3, Williams 0-1

Attendance: 813