ORONO – Zeke Rodgers prayed.

The University of Connecticut quarterback and his teammates watched the University of Maine’s Tom Dadmun put plenty of leg into a potential game-winning field goal with 13 seconds left in Saturday afternoon’s Homecoming football game.

Dadmun was kicking into a stiff cross breeze, and there was no question that his 37-yard attempt had the height and the distance to give the Bears a dramatic come-from-behind victory.

But the ball hit the right upright, and a UConn team that had lost its previous three games by a total of seven points survived for a 14-13 victory.

UConn is now 4-4 overall, 3-2 in the Yankee Conference. Maine is 3-4 and 2-3 in the conference.

“When he kicked it, it was going straight down the middle,” said UConn senior tight end Tom Bachonski. “The wind was blowing across (from left to right) and the ball just seemed to hang up. Then it sailed to the right. It was unbelievable.”

“It looked good until it hit the pole,” said UConn senior linebacker Paul Duckworth. “But we were due for a break.”

“I aimed just inside the left goalpost,” Dadmun said. “I hit it pretty good. The ball wasn’t tailing. The wind just blew it.”

Rodgers had good reason to pray because the UConn quarterback had turned the wrong way to hand the ball off on successive plays earlier in the fourth quarter, resulting in a loss of nine yards and a blown opportunity to extend the lead.

“I owe God one,” said Rodgers.

The Bears rallied dramatically into position for Dadmun’s game-winning attempt.

They took over at their own 17-yard line with 3:06 left and covered 62 yards in nine plays. A 15-yard shovel pass from Maine quarterback Emilio Colon to Steve Knight and Colon’s 22-yard completion over the middle to James Rice sparked the drive.

But UConn linebacker Bruce Bourgoin blitzed and pressured Colon into an incompletion, and Scott Mitchell nearly intercepted Colon’s third-down pass to set up the field goal try.

The game was a defensive struggle.

Maine held UConn to 102 total yards over the first 29 minutes of the game and took a 13-0 lead on Dadmun field goals of 36 and 30 yards and a nine-yard touchdown run by freshman Andre Pam.

Pam’s run capped a five-play, 83-yard drive that featured a 49-yard over-the-head catch by Frizell Davis. The touchdown came with only 53 seconds left in the half.

But the Huskies came right back as Rodgers hit open flanker Brian Reid for 29 yards and, after a Wilbur Gilliard six-yard run, Rodgers hooked up with Monte Nowden on a 26-yard scoring strike with 18 seconds left in the half.

“I told Monte `Let’s see what you’ve got,’ ” said Rodgers. He underthrew the ball but saw the 6-foot-3 Nowden outjump Maine’s 5-foot-11 Anthony Jackson for the ball and hang onto it after taking a hit from Jemal Murph.

“Monte made a great play on the ball,” said Rodgers.

“Zeke made a good throw,” said Nowden. “I was able to get my hands on the ball and when (Murph) hit me coming back, he actually pushed the ball back into my body.”

“That gave us some real momentum,” said UConn Coach Tom Jackson.

“That really hurt. That breathed life into them,” said Maine Coach Jack Cosgrove.

UConn had three turnovers in the first half. UConn’s defense limited the Bears to one first down in the second half until Maine’s final drive and the Bears finished with only 100 total yards in the half.

The Huskies went ahead with 28 seconds left in the third period as Gilliard’s one-yard TD plunge finished off a seven-play, 52-yard drive that featured a 12-yard pass from Rodgers to Reid and an 18-yarder from Rodgers to Bachonski.

UConn’s Jackson credited his defense with making the difference in the game.

“Very few teams win with five turnovers, but our defense was very strong,” said the UConn coach, whose defensive unit was led by linebacker Jim Reppi’s 10 tackles and strong safety Gary Bailey’s eight tackles and one interception.

Linebackers Ross Fichthorn and Murph paced the Maine defensive effort with 12 and 11 tackles, respectively.

Huskies 14, Black Bears 13

Connecticut 0 7 7 0 -14

Maine 3 10 0 0 -13

M – Dadmun 36 field goal

M – Dadmun 30 field goal

M – Pam 9 run (Dadmun kick)

C – Nowden 26 pass from Rodgers (Sosik kick)

C – Gilliard 1 run (Sosik kick)

UConn Maine First downs 16 14 Rushing: att. – yards 48-131 44-156 Passing: att. – comp. 19-11 26-11 Yards passing 175 158 Total yards 306 314 Intercepted by 1 2 Punts – average 5-29.8 6-41.3 Fumbles – lost 3-3 0-0 Penalties – yards 0-0 4-30

INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS

RUSHING – UConn: Gilliard 23-69, Schuman 4-22, Edwards 6-17, Rodgers 10-16, Nook 3-7, Long 2-0; Maine: Jameson 18-52, Pam 11-40, Knight 9-35, Tubbs 4-29, Baur 2-0

PASSING – UConn: Rodgers 10-18-2-139, Valente 1-1-0-36; Maine: Colon 11-26-1-158

RECEIVING – UConn: Nowden 4-84, Reid 3-50, Bachonski 2-29, Gilliard 2-12; Maine: Davis 2-60, Gaine 2-24, Rice 1-22, Knight 2-19, Squires 1-12, Jameson 1-10, Baur 1-8, Cates 1-3