Louisiana State University, which has five of its top six scorers returning from last year’s 27-8 Final Four team, will be the first opponent for the University of Maine women’s basketball team as the Bears embark on an ambitious schedule.

LSU lost to Tennessee 52-50 in their Final Four semifinal.

Seimone Augustus, who averaged 19.4 points and six rebounds per game, and Temeka Johnson who averaged 12.8 points and 8.3 assists, head up the list of LSU returnees.

They have another NCAA Tournament team on their schedule in 27-5 Montana. The Bears will travel to play in Montana’s Lady Griz Classic.

Florida State, St. Joseph’s (Pa.), Louisville and Arizona State were WNIT Tournament teams last season and Maine could play three of them in tournaments.

Maine will face LSU in their opener at the Women’s Sports Foundation in Baton Rouge, La. on Nov. 11 and they will face either Virginia or Arizona State the next night.

The Bears will host Loyola (Md.) in their Dead River Classic opener in Orono and will meet either Mississippi State or St. Joseph’s the next night.

Maine meets Montana in the Lady Griz Holiday Classic on Dec. 28 and will take on other Florida State or Louisville the next day.

In addition, Maine will travel to play Southern Methodist University and Buffalo before coming home to play Big Ten schools Indiana and Michigan on Dec. 10 and Dec. 18.

The Bears went 25-7 last season and won the America East Tournament which earned them a berth to the NCAA Tournament.

Maine, 17-1 in conference regular season play, will open their AE schedule at Binghamton on Jan. 5.

“This is probably the most exciting season that we have ahead of us,” said Maine fifth-year coach Sharon Versyp in a press release. “We are playing the toughest schedule we have ever had here in the history of Maine women’s basketball. We are hoping this non-conference schedule will prepare us for conference play, which will be our avenue to get back to the NCAA Tournament and take that one step further.”

Maine lost to Texas Tech, 60-50, in their NCAA Tournament opener last season.

AE accepts Huskies’ resignation

America East will officially accept the resignation of Northeastern University at the end of the upcoming 2004-2005 season.

That will allow the Boston-based school to join the Colonial Athletic Association.

America East will still have automatic qualifiers into NCAA Tournament play in 12 sports despite Northeastern’s departure.

America East sponsors championships in 22 sports and its membership includes Albany, Binghamton, Boston University, Hartford, Maine, Maryland-Baltimore County, New Hampshire, Stony Brook and Vermont along with Northeastern.

Quinnipiac University (Conn.) is an associate member in men’s lacrosse.

“The focus of the nine continuing members of America East is on the future,” said AE Commissioner Chris Monasch in a press release. “The last three years have seen a steady increase in the performance of our conference schools both on the athletic fields and in the classroom. Our sole focus now is on the continuation of this trend.”

USM, Bowdoin choose coaches

The University of Southern Maine has a new women’s ice hockey coach in former University of Maine assistant Amanda Adams and Bowdoin College has named Courtney Mattingly their new women’s assistant basketball coach.

Adams played at Yale University and spent last year working on her master’s degree in education at the University of Denver.

She had been the head coach of Quinnipiac University’s club team. She had also been an assistant at Minnesota-Mankato.

She will replace Dave Venditti, who left after four seasons to take the head coaching position at Colby College in Waterville.

The Huskies went 14-10-1 last year.

Mattingly, is a 2003 graduate of St. Bonaventure (N.Y.) who was an assistant coach at Ithaca College last year.

Mattingly will join coach Stefanie Pemper and a Bowdoin team that went 30-1 a year ago with its only loss coming in the NCAA Division III championship game.

Bowdoin has reached the NCAA Tournament four straight years.