Clippers knock off Braves UMM in Bunyan final

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BANGOR – The drought of a decade is over.

The University of Maine-Machias Clippers ended a 10-year winless streak against the Husson College men’s basketball team with a come-from-behind 84-77 victory in the opening round of the 38th Paul Bunyan Invitational basketball tournament.

“Our guys are ecstatic,” said first-year UMM coach Randy Lee. “They’ve had the upper hand for the better part of the last decade so we are happy with this.”

In Friday night’s first game at Husson’s Newman Gymnasium, Fisher College of downed the University of Maine-Augusta 80-74.

In the second game, the inside-outside duo of UMM’s Wayne Clark and Bayi Handy led the Clippers to the momentous win, and both got better as the game wore on.

Clark scored 14 of his 20 points and grabbed eight of his 10 rebounds in the second half while playing solid man-to-man defense on Husson big man Buddy Leavitt, who had 11 of 22 points and three of 13 rebounds in the second half.

“We knew we were giving up two many offensive rebounds so we had to lock Leavitt down more,” said Clark. “He’s a great player coming from D1 level, so we figured if we could keep the ball out of his hands and make the other guys beat us, we had a chance to win the game.”

Handy came up with 12 of his 19 points and five of his eight assists in the second half and helped the Clippers’ offense set sail by cranking up the fast break.

“We knew Husson was a good team and an NAIA powerhouse, but coach told us we could run on these guys and we did,” said Handy, a 5-foot-11 senior guard who transferred from Georgia State.

Husson, now 1-2 on the season, held an 18-12 rebounding edge at the half, but turned that around into a 20-14 advantage in the second. Another switch came in the shooting category, where UMM’s defensive pressure helped lower Husson’s field goal percentage from 50 to 40 percent. Meanwhile, the 7-6 Clippers stayed hot and consistent at 50 percent for both halves.

The Clippers scored 10 of the first 12 points in the second half and led by as many as 12 points before a 10-0 Braves run made it a tie game with 31/2 minutes left. Then UMM scored eight of the next 10 to retake the lead for good.

“If you don’t executed in the last three minutes of a tight game, you’re not going to win,” said Braves coach Warren Caruso. “We didn’t execute on either end of the floor, taking bad shots and not getting defensive rebounds.”

Husson showed few signs of inexperience despite missing several players to injury or eligibility … Not that Lee expected them to.

“They may be undermanned, but they still have a heck of a point guard in Ailey, Leavitt’s a Division I player and Jeff White’s a great player who came from USM,” Lee said. “Undermanned? Maybe, but they’re still very talented.”

Senior guard Dwayne Ailey had 15 points, five rebounds and five assists. Scott Griffin added 11 points, but was held to two boards, all in the first half.

Gary Dussard had 15 points, eight rebounds and six assists to contribute to the Clippers’ solid all-around effort.

CLIPPERS 84, BRAVES 77

UM-Machias (7-6) Husson (1-2)

Player G AG F AF TP Player G AG AF TP

Munro 0 1 0 0 0 Beauregard 2 7

Dussard 6 15 3 5 15 J.White 3 6 7

Handy 8 14 0 0 19 Ailey 6 17 15

Midgley 3 4 2 2 8 Cunninghm 2 8

Gayle 1 3 0 0 2 Griffeth 0 2

Johnson 2 4 1 2 5 Grant 2 3 5

Simmons 3 6 3 4 11 Griffin 4 4 11

Cerimagic 0 0 0 0 0 Leavitt 9 20 22

Clark 8 11 4 6 20

Morgan 1 4 1 2 4

Totals 32 62 14 21 84 Totals 28 62 14 16 77

UM-Machias 40 84

Husson 42 77

3-pt. goals ? UM-Machias (6-17): Handy 3-5, Simmons 2-4, Morgan 1-4, Dussard 0-4; Husson (7-19): Beauregard 2-2, Leavitt 2-6, Grant 1-1, J. White 1-2, Cunningham 1-5, Ailey 0-3

Attendance: 350 (est.)

In the first game, the Falcons withstood a determined second half comeback attempt by the Moose, who whittled a 12-point deficit with 13:44 left down to three 10 minutes later, thanks to 10-2 and 8-2 runs over a seven-minute period late in the second half.

Chris Blodgett (18 points) of Wilton had the hot hand for UMA with six points in a 2 1/2-minute span, but it wasn’t quite enough to totally overcome his team’s deficit.

Despite hitting just six of eight free throws in the final three minutes, the 5-5 Falcons still managed to stay ahead, thanks to a game-high, 27-point effort from Josh Nelson. The sophomore forward also dished out a game-high six assists. Jofre Cruz kicked in 19 and Jovan Holland added 10 while Kessen Green grabbed a game-best 15 rebounds.

Coop Nickerson led the 4-4 Moose with 19 points and 14 rebounds. Donald Harbin had 13 points and six assists.

UM-Augusta (4-4) 74

Groder, Harbin 6-1-13, Hunter 3-0-8, Nickerson 6-7-19, Blodgett 7-4-18, Lewis 2-2-6, Je. Couture, Joseph 4-0-10, Brady, Manix

Fisher (5-5) 80

Cruz 6-4-19, Holland 5-0-10, Nelson 10-5-27, Green 1-0-2, Massie 2-4-8, Manning, Gomez 4-6-14

3-pt. goals: Couture 2-3, Hunter 2-7, Lewis 0-1, Harbin 0-2; Cruz 3-3, Nelson 2-2

Halftime: Fisher 45-33

A-150 (est.)