This weekend was supposed to mark University of Maine hockey’s regular season swan song on Bangor television station WABI (Channel 5).

Instead, provided the UMaine men’s basketball team cooperates by winning on Saturday, WABI will double the fun for Black Bear fans with a hockey-hoops weekend offering.

Actually, UMaine sports fans with cable or satellite TV access will get a chance to see all three of Maine’s “flagship” winter sports programs in action this weekend as Saturday’s Maine women’s basketball game is airing live on Fox Sports Net New England.

The opportunity to carry Sunday’s America East conference men’s basketball semifinal literally came out of the blue for WABI station officials.

“That’s how I would have to put that, yes. It did literally drop out of the sky for us. They called us Tuesday and asked if we wanted this,” said station program director Steve Hiltz. “I said ‘I don’t know, what’s the deal?’ and they told me they were doing the semifinals.”

Hiltz asked if he could call AE officials right back and went in search of sales manager Tom Gass and station manager Mike Young.

“They both thought it was a great idea, but the only question was whether we could fit it in – schedule-wise,” Hiltz said. “If they win Saturday, we’re going to bump CBS’ Florida at Kentucky game for the Maine men at noon.”

Should No. 4 Maine lose to No. 5 Binghamton University in Saturday’s noon AE quarterfinal playoff, WABI would air the Kentucky-Florida game.

The most challenging aspect to America East’s offer was timing. Could station officials sell most of the advertising spots for Sunday’s potential game in a three-day period?

“It’s a little bit scary when you get a call like that because you know you don’t have a lot of time,” Hiltz said. “Ironically, I think we sold it in two days. It’s literally amazing to be able to go out and offer something like this on the fly and be able to virtually sell it out in 36 hours.”

The chance to add another Maine sports telecast to WABI’s Black Bear programming stable was too good to pass up.

“We’re really, really happy to be able to pick up something like this because it’s good to be able to consolidate our position as the UMaine station,” he said.

Hiltz said if the Maine men win Saturday, WABI will promote Sunday’s broadcast heavily during its 7 p.m. Saturday broadcast of the Maine-Boston College hockey game in Orono.

The Maine women’s basketball game at Hartford, Conn., Saturday will air live at 2 p.m. on FSNNE. The AE men’s semifinals will also air on New England Sports Network, but only in the Boston TV market.

East gets Maine PBS spotlight

The Eastern Maine Class A tournament will command most of the attention – viewer-wise – from Maine Public Television this weekend.

Due primarily to the shifting of some traditional Western Maine schools like Lewiston and Edward Little of Auburn into the Eastern ranks, viewers in the Topsham, Brunswick, Lewiston-Auburn and Augusta areas will get the live TV feeds from the East tournament semifinals and finals.

Four of the five Maine PBS affiliate stations will see Eastern Maine tourney coverage. Only WMEA-TV (Ch. 26) in Biddeford will provide coverage of the West games. The other four – Orono’s WMEB (Ch. 12), Calais’ WMED (Ch. 13), Presque Isle’s WMEM (Ch. 10) and Augusta’s WCBB (Ch. 10) – will air the East games Thursday, Friday and Saturday night.

Viewers with digital cable or satellite systems have a choice as both regions’ games, as well as normal Public TV programming, will be aired on Maine PBS’ digital channel (Ch. 17, Augusta).

“That’s the great thing about the digital channel is it really varies your choices and allows you to see either game or normal PBS shows,” said Rhonda Morin, Maine Public Television’s media relations director.

Andrew Neff can be reached at 990-8205, 1-800-310-8600 or aneff@bangordailynews.net.