Stupinski, Mims gain top state awards

BANGOR – Considering the way her basketball season ended, Erika Stupinski was surprised when she heard her name called at the end of Friday night’s Maine Association of Basketball Coaches annual awards evening.

Stupinski, who played in just six games for the Mount Ararat of Topsham girls basketball team before suffering a season-ending shoulder injury, was named Miss Maine Basketball.

Stupinski was joined by Brunswick High standout Ralph Mims, who was named Mr. Basketball during the banquet at Husson College’s Newman Gymnasium.

The announcement of the Mr. and Miss Maine Basketball awards was the highlight of the evening, which also included recognition for the Maine McDonald’s senior all-star teams, academic all-state teams, regional free-throw shooting champions, all-star coaches , and other honors.

Stupinski, a 5-foot-9 guard, dislocated her left shoulder in a Jan. 2 game against Lawrence of Fairfield and didn’t play again. The Eagles got to the Eastern Maine Class A semifinals.

In the six games she did play, Stupinski averaged 18.5 points five rebounds, eight assists and 5.5 steals per game.

“I was extremely surprised. [Fellow Miss Basketball finalist] Kara Borelli is one of my great friends, I’ve played AAU with her for as long as I can remember,” Stupinski said. “She’s had an outstanding career. I thought she would have won it. But I was so surprised.”

She recently was named a Kennebec Valley Athletic Conference first-team all-star. Stupinski has a scholarship to play basketball for Division II Stonehill College of Easton, Mass.

As if he wasn’t already considered one of the state’s top basketball players in the past three years, Mims’ stock certainly rose in the Eastern Maine Class A tournament. He averaged 24.7 points and 6.7 rebounds en route to winning the MVP award for the second time in three years.

He put up another 46 points in the Class A state championship game. That game was an overtime loss to Portland, but Mims said it wasn’t too hard standing next to Bulldog senior Rocco Toppi, who was also a Mr. Basketball finalist, during Friday’s ceremony.

“I’ve known him for so long, playing against him in AAU, in this tournament, that tournament,” Mims said. “[Toppi and fellow finalist Corey Tielinen] were mumbling in my ear, ‘You’re going to win’ and I think it’s great to have friends like that, for them not to [hold] that against me, it’s great.”

Mims is undecided on college but is considering a number of Division I scholarship offers.

Tielinen played at Oxford Hills in South Paris. The other girls finalists were Borelli of Westbrook and Greely of Cumberland Center’s Abby Marstaller.

Harry True received the Bob Brown Contributor Award. A former headmaster at Maine Central Institute in Pittsfield and longtime high school coach, is currently an assistant to his son, Paul True, the girls basketball coach at Skowhegan High.

Tom Nolette, a Sanford native, picked up the Media Award for his work as the president of mbr.org, a Web site devoted to basketball around the state. He has also served as the AAU boys state director.

Around 600 people attended Friday’s banquet, the biggest group in at least eight years, according to Kristin Lamas Patterson of Swardlick Marketing Group, which organizes the weekend for McDonald’s.

The senior all-star activities continue today at 9 a.m. with the free-throw shooting contest.

The East C-D girls will take on the West C-D girls at 10 a.m. The C-D boys game will follow at 11:25 a.m., then the A-B girls at 12:50 p.m. and the A-B boys at 2:15 p.m. Tickets for the game are $5 and benefit Ronald McDonald House Charities of Maine.