ORONO, Maine — Behind solid play from its rookies, Hartford men's basketball grinded out a 55-49 victory inside Memorial Gymnasium on Saturday afternoon. Led by a game-high 15 points from freshman
Moses Flowers, the Hawks (13-10) received 33 points from their freshman class to improve to 6-2 in the America East with their third-straight win.
Sergio El Darwich matched Flowers for a game-high in scoring with 15 points for the Black Bears (6-16), who fall to 2-6 in conference play.
HARTFORD 55, MAINE 49
Maine came out of the gates hot, jumping out to a 10-3 lead with 15:51 left in the half. But Hartford stormed back with a late rally, scoring the final 13 points of the half to take a 25-18 lead into the break. Five different players contributed to that spurt, which was capped by a layup from freshman
PJ Henry inside the final minute.
A sluggish start to the second half that saw just two field goals from Hartford over the first 10-plus minutes allowed Maine to claw back and tie up the game at 33-33 with 9:41 left to play. The Black Bears would never reclaim the lead, though, as Flowers and classmate
Miroslav Stafl combined to put together a 14-2 run for Hartford. Flowers began the rally by single-handedly outscoring Maine, 10-2, before Stafl capped things off with four-straight points to give the Hawks their largest lead of the game (47-35) with just over four minutes left.
The Black Bears managed to pull within seven, but wouldn't come any closer, as sophomore
Hunter Marks delivered the dagger with a three-pointer inside the final minute.
INSIDE THE BOX & NOTES
- At 6-2, the Hawks are off to their best start in conference play since also going 6-2 in 2002-03
- Grad transfer Malik Ellison registered 13 points, while freshman Miroslav Stafl added 12 points and a game-high nine rebounds
- Freshman PJ Henry contributed six points off the bench
- The Hawks scored 15 points off of 15 turnovers
- Hartford took care of the ball, committing a season-low nine miscues
- The Hawks turned in a 12-for-15 effort from the free-throw line, finishing at 80.0 percent on the game
- With its fifth straight win over Maine, Hartford improves to 46-31 all-time against the Black Bears
NEXT ON TAP
The Hawks remain on the road for their next game, as they trek to UMBC for a Wednesday night matchup. Tipoff from UMBC Events Center is set for 7 p.m. on ESPN+.
For more information on the Hartford men's basketball team, stay with HartfordHawks.com for updates and follow the team on social media (
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Instagram).
