ORONO – The season-opening game at Montana is only eight days away for the University of Maine football team.

With such a big challenge in front of them, the Black Bears weren’t about to go out and beat themselves senseless Thursday afternoon during their final preseason scrimmage.

Coach Jack Cosgrove and his staff put their starters through their paces by evaluating their play in numerous down-and-distance situations, but did not allow them to engage in full contact on a bright, breezy afternoon on Morse Field at Alfond Stadium.

“We call it a stand-up scrimmage,” said Cosgrove, who explained the rationale for having the first-team players show restraint in going through their paces.

“We learned some hard lessons from our last scrimmage of the spring and the fall in the past, so it’s one of those asterisk deals where we’re going to be thankful for the health that we have right now and not risk anything to jeopardize our travel squad that we send out to Montana,” said Cosgrove, who had about six players, including three or four regulars, sit out the scrimmage with injuries.

“It’s something that we’ve tended to go to over the past couple years in a way of managing our players and making sure that we’ve got our best 11 ready to go,” Cosgrove said.

As opposed to most practices, the Bears lined up the starting offense against the starting defense to provide for some quality repetitions with the top 22 players on the field.

The defensive unit appeared to get the best of the action, while the offense tested out numerous formations and plays in a variety of different potential game situations.

The second-string groups, in contrast, were allowed to engage in full-contact action. There was plenty of intensity from those players, including freshman tailback Keien Williams and a fired-up defense.

UMaine was looking for “execution in situations with the ones [starters] and football from the twos,” Cosgrove said. “A lot of those guys are still trying to get our attention as to: can they play and can we put them in a game at Montana next week?”

With the end of Thursday’s scrimmage came the end of preseason training camp. It also marked the last of the Bears’ double sessions.

Now, UMaine will focus its attention squarely on game preparations for Montana.

Black Bear Invitational begins

The UMaine women’s soccer team has the distinction of playing the first countable game of the Maine fall college season today when it hosts the Black Bear Invitational.

Coach Scott Atherley’s Black Bears take on Sacred Heart at 4:30 p.m. That contest will follow the 2 p.m. tournament opener between Providence and Marist.

On Sunday, UMaine and Providence meet at 2 p.m. after Marist and Sacred Heart play at noon.

“I think it’s a very competitive tournament for the first one of the year,” Atherley said. “Sacred Heart went to the NCAA Tournament two years ago and lost in their conference championship last year to Central Connecticut, which went to the second round of the NCAA Tournament.”

UMaine, 13-3-3 last season and the America East runner-up, will try to replace eight graduated seniors and senior back Linda Consolante, who is out for the season with an injury.

“We have a relatively new team,” Atherley said. “There’s enough jitters in anticipation of the start of the season so it makes it a lot easier to be at home [to open the season].”

UMaine prided itself on defense, ranking 20th in the country with a 0.65 goals-against average. The defense is spearheaded by goalkeeper Tanya Adorno, who posted 10 shutouts a year ago, along with backs Allison Kelly, Angela Clark and Emily Stevens.

UMaine’s top returning scorer is Heather Hathorn of Scarborough, who tallied eight goals and three assists for 19 points in 2003 to rank second on the team.

However, the Bears will feature some talented newcomers, including ‘keeper Jasmine Phillips and midfielders Marie-Michele Bouchard and Marie-Andree Canuel.