AUBURN — Kyle Brown approached Tony Bobbitt with a pen and paper and an unusual request.

“Can I have your phone number? I want to invite you to my birthday,” said Brown, of Bowdoin, who will turn 11 next week.

Brown had to settle for giving Bobbitt his mother, Darci’s phone number, in case the Maine Red Claws guard could take time out of his busy schedule for cake and ice cream and maybe a present. 

Local basketball fans got a gift Thursday night, as did the Edward Little and Lewiston high school athletic funds, which benefited from the event. The Red Claws, the new NBA Development League team based in Portland, held the first public intrasquad scrimmage in franchise history at the Edward Little High School gymnasium. The Blue beat the White, 76-67, but the 1,200 fans in attendance weren’t pulling for either side so much as hoping to see some high-flying action.

They got it, from Bobbitt, who drew “oohs” and “aahs” from the crowd for one sequence where he hit a reverse layup, threw down a dunk, then drilled a 3-pointer for the White. The Blue provided some excitement at the end of the third quarter when forward Stanley Thomas came from under basket to block a shot and Tyrelle Blair sank a 45-foot buzzer-beater.

“It went pretty good. We’ve still got to get into a lot better shape,” coach Austin Ainge said. “The first half looked better than the second half. We’ve got a long way to go execution-wise, but we have some good players, so that’s a great starting point.”

Ainge said it was good to get the players in front of a live crowd after five days of training camp at the Portland Expo.

“(The crowd) was amazing,” he said. “They were here early and cheering us from warm-ups all the way to the end. A couple of guys on the team, you could tell, had a little extra bounce in their step with all those eyeballs in front of them.”

“We’ve been beating up on each other in practice every day,” Bobbitt said. “It’s been fun, but it’s been hard. We’ve been listening to our coaches and paying attention to detail and playing as hard as we can possibly play.”

Fans greeted the Red Claws warmly, none moreso than Matt Clement, a former Lawrence High School and Maine Maritime star who earned a spot on the training camp roster after a tryout.

“It’s nice to get such a nice ovation, a few extra cheers for the Maine guy,” said Clement, who played an exhibition game at EL when he was with Lawrence 10 years ago. “It went pretty well. It was the first public scrimmage, so it’s going to be a little rough around the edges, but I think we did most of our things right and gave the fans a pretty good show.”

No doubt Red Claws brass were hoping to make a good impression on central Maine fans. Ticket sales for the regular season have been brisk. The 3,100-seat Expo is sold out for their season-opener on Dec. 4, but tickets still remain for the Claws’ first and only exhibition game with the Springfield Armor on Nov. 23.

Ten members of Paul and Diane Beaucage’s family, including four grandchildren, sat high above the Red Claws bench and took in the action and even got a picture taken with Crusher, the Red Claws’ mascot.

“We all came out and we’ve enjoyed it,” said Diane Beaucage, of Auburn, who regularly watch their grandson, Brandon Giguere, play for the Red Eddies. “We might go down to a game. We won’t get season tickets because we’re so busy, but we’ll probably go. This is good. We need something like this in our area.”

Local fans aren’t the only ones getting involved in the Red Claws. Bridgette Goulet of Auburn and Tamiko O’Connell of Lewiston of Lewiston are members of the Red Claws’ dance team. Josh Titus of Auburn is the team manager, and Frank Stetson, a well-known local radio announcer, is their public address announcer.