ORONO – When Christina Mosher dreamt of playing basketball at the University of Maine, she dreamt of wearing the home whites or road blues, not a practice jersey, and she dreamt of pouring every ounce of sweat and energy she had into an important conference game, not in the weight room.

“You always think about wanting to go there to play,” the 6-foot-2 freshman from Farmington said, “but you never think about preseason and all of that extra hard work you have to put in.”

“We had a whole summer to just get programmed for lifting and conditioning,” she added. “But as much as you want to prepare yourself for it, it still wasn’t the same.”

It couldn’t simulate two-a-day workouts and regular sessions in the weight room before the first basketball practice takes place. There were already aches and pains and fatigue before Midnight Madness even arrived in mid-October. By the time the first preseason game tipped off, Mosher’s body had been through the equivalent of a high school season.

All of the hard work of preseason comes to an end Friday night and gives way to the sometimes overwhelming grind of the regular season, which begins for the University of Maine women in Clemson, SC. If Mosher rebounded and played well enough defensively in the preseason to impress new head coach Cindy Blodgett, she could carve for herself a significant role on a very young Black Bears squad (one senior, 10 sophomores and freshmen) with a wide-open battle for playing time.

Whether she has a spot in the regular rotation right now or will have to do more to earn it in the coming weeks, Mosher faces the biggest challenge of her basketball life.

“Mentally and physically it’s a challenge, because in high school, the majority of these players were the best player on their team. So just making the adjustment to come in and not necessarily have that role is big,” Blodgett said. “From a physical standpoint, they’re going to feel it every day. They’re going up against stronger people every day, in a game or in practice. Then the season is a longer season than they have in high school, so they’re going to hit a point where they feel that difference between an 18-game schedule and a 28-game schedule.”

Barnies blends in

Troy Barnies’ eyes look up as he runs down his daily itinerary for a typical October day. Lifting first thing in the morning, classes, individual workouts midday, more classes, maybe time for a shower or to grab a bite to eat, then play a little pickup ball as a team.

“Besides classes, basketball is pretty much our whole day,” the former Edward Little star said. “Morning, afternoon, evening. There are just so many things to build as a team.”

Barnies’ days as Mr. Maine Basketball are well behind him. Now, he’s just one of four freshmen trying to blend in, one of the building blocks for a team. It’s his turn to blend in now.

“When we all came in, we were just starting to get to know each other. Some of us knew how we played. Me and (Gardiner’s) Sean McNally have been playing together for the past four years. But coming in with Junior Bernal and Philippe Bofia, we had to adjust to how they play and what their style is,” Barnies said.

Unlike Mosher, who spent a full month in Orono before school started, Barnies just spent a couple of weekends at the Orono campus over the summer. He trained at home in Auburn the rest of the time.

“Every Wednesday, I had to run a mile, then the next Wednesday two miles, the next Wednesday three miles…all under certain times,” he said. “It helped me a lot getting ready for this. We did that for conditioning for the past three weeks and I made all my times.”

“I’m very pleased,” head coach Ted Woodward said of Barnies’ preparation for this season. “I feel like he’s a little bit ahead of the curve compared to normal freshmen.”

Roles on Woodward’s team aren’t as undefined as they are on the women’s side. It only takes a few minutes of talking to Woodward to make it clear that he has big plans for the 6-foot-7 Barnies, who is willing to start small but thinks he can find the way to his coach’s heart.

“Obviously, I’m a freshman and being a role player on the team would be a big deal for me,” he said. “But I know he’s looking for players who just want to play defense for him, rebound and just win.”

“He provides a certain amount of toughness to our team, just in his personality and the way that he plays,” Woodward said. “Certainly Troy does a lot of physically athletic things that are even unique at this level.”

“He’ll grow quickly,” he added. “He loves the game. He’s around it. I really believe he has a chance to make a tremendous impact on our team for a long time.”

No pushovers

By their very nature, freshmen take a while to assert themselves. Mosher herself declares that, “You can’t be weak or you’re going to get pushed around.”

Mosher was speaking about playing in the paint, which gets a lot more punishing in college. The poundings that are taken and dished out in the lane and under the basket in college are unlike anything she saw at Mt. Blue, where Mosher could push practically everyone else around from the time she was a freshman.

“My big thing that I need to work on is strengthening. That’s my major focus,” she said. “Everyone (in college) is strong in the post.”

Mosher was the leading rebounder in the annual Blue-White scrimmage but saw just a minute of action in the exhibition game with New Brunswick.

The Black Bear women open their regular season Friday at Clemson.

While Mosher is working on getting stronger, Barnies is working on getting, well, slower.

“What I’ve been doing lately has been…too fast for a lot of the stuff we do,” he said. “So I’ve been working on trying to slow things down, adjust and be fundamental about it.”

Barnies drew the start at forward in last Friday night’s exhibition with Dalhousie (Nova Scotia) University but missed both shot attempts in limited action. The Black Bear men open their season in Memphis tonight against Richmond in the Coaches vs. Cancer tournament.