Fred Brown was the Georgetown guard who, in the 1982 NCAA Championship game, threw the ball directly to North Carolina’s James Worthy and ended any hopes of a last-second game-winning shot for the Hoyas.

Brown’s name came up again Thursday night at the Bangor Auditorium.

Trailing by one with 25 seconds left, the University of Maine’s Tracey Frenette, late in the 5-second count, forced an inbounds pass directly to a Lamar University player, leading the visiting Cardinals to an exciting 69-68 women’s basketball victory over the Black Bears.

Lamar, which spent last week ranked 23rd nationally, moved to 20-2 with the victory. The heartbreaking loss dropped Maine to 12-7.

The late-game scenario was this:

With Maine leading 66-64 with 1:30 left, Lamar 5-foot point guard Brenda Hatchett swished a baseline three-pointer to put the Cardinals up by one.

The teams swapped turnovers (Maine’s Carrie Goodhue was whistled for a player-control foul and Lamar’s Uirannah Jackson threw the ball away) before the Black Bears called a timeout with 25 seconds left.

With Frenette taking the ball out near the sideline hash mark nearest the Maine bench, the seconds ticked away while Black Bear players tried to free themselves from Lamar’s in-their-shirts defense.

Finally, Frenette forced the ball toward a crowd and directly to Lamar’s Bobbie Bean, who got the ball to point guard Brenda Hatchett, who was then fouled by Maine’s Chris Strong.

Hatchett, who had a game-high 20 points, sank both free throws with 18 ticks left, pushing the Lamar lead to 69-66.

The Bears, after a timeout, looked for a three-pointer. With no opening, they went inside to senior center Rachel Bouchard, who scored to cut the lead to one with five seconds left. Lamar then ran out the clock for the victory.

“It’s unfortunate. I don’t want to blame the loss on just one incident,” Maine Coach Trish Roberts said. “There were a lot of things that led up to us not winning the game. It just so happened that that one turnover came at a critical time. It was a big loss for us.”

Two other things proved critical to Maine dropping its second game in its last three outings.

Bouchard (19 points, 8 rebounds) spent more than 10 minutes on the bench in the first half with three fouls. She picked up her first two in the game’s first four minutes and foul No. 3 came with 10:42 remaining. With her on the bench, Maine’s inside game was minimal against the three Lamar 6-footers.

Also, with Bouchard on the bench, Coach Al Barbre’s Cardinals dominated the offensive glass, at times scoring on third, fourth, or fifth tries.

“We just didn’t box out well,” Roberts said. “They kept getting two or three shots. We didn’t hit the offensive boards at all. We were only getting one shot. When you go up against a team that is big and strong like Lamar, you’ve got to do those little intangible things.”

“That (offensive rebounding) will help anytime,” Barbre said. “We were able to get some second chance points.”

Coming out of the locker room with a 34-31 lead, Lamar saw Maine jump back on top 37-36 at the start of the second. The Cards battled back to grab a 42-37 advantage, but a 10-4 Maine run put the Black Bears up by one, 47-46, with 13:27.

Things went back and forth for the next 10 minutes and the teams found themselves knotted at 63 with 3:38 left.

A Bouchard basket and a Bouchard foul shot – opposite a Hatchett foul shot – gave Maine a two-point edge leading up to Hatchett’s three-pointer.

Cardinals 69, Black Bears 68

Lamar Maine women

Name AG G AF F TP Name AG G AF F TP

Hatchett 13 6 8 6 20 Strong 6 2 2 1 5

Jones 7 2 0 0 0 Frenette 10 4 2 2 10

Bean 8 2 8 5 9 Briggs 6 2 4 4 8

Mosley 11 2 6 4 8 Goodhue 10 4 0 0 8

Jackson 13 8 4 3 19 Bradstreet 11 4 2 2 12

Island 6 3 1 1 7 Bouchard 10 9 2 1 19

Woods 0 0 0 0 0 Buetow 0 0 0 0 0

Rogers 4 1 0 0 2 Carpenter 5 3 0 0 6

Totals 62 24 27 19 69 Totals 58 28 12 10 68

Lamar 34 69

Maine 31 68

3-pt. goals: Maine (2-2): Bradstreet 2-2; Lamar (2-6): Hatchett 2-6.