The Delaware Blue lost their second game of the season to the reigning Eastern Conference champions, the Maine Celtics, by a score of 130-111.

The game was close throughout the first and second quarters, with the team only trailing by seven going into halftime.

The difference came in the third quarter when they were outscored 43-27. Throughout the quarter, it seemed like the Celtics couldn’t miss from beyond the arc. The Celtics’ first-round pick was especially on fire, hitting five threes in the quarter.

“They played very well, and then everything went wrong for us,” head coach Mike Longabardi said. “It became a snowball effect. Our offense really hurt our defense. They did a really good job defensively, but we struggled to score. It then turned into us not defending.”

The team also struggled on offense initially in the second half.

“We just came out with bad energy,” Judah Mintz said. “They hit a couple of big threes early and boosted the lead to 13. I think that deflated us a little bit. That’s something we cannot have, and we’ll clean it up going forward.”

The team shot 37% from three throughout the game, a decent percentage, but they only took 27 attempts compared to Maine’s 41.

“I liked the shots, but we needed to take more of them,” Longabardi said. “That’s my only rebuttal—we took too many midrange twos, which is what they want you to do.”

The Celtics played strong perimeter defense throughout the game, trying to prevent the Blue Coats from building any momentum from three.

Mintz was one of the players who likely took too many midrange twos. Even though he hit most of them, they aren’t highly efficient shots. On three-point attempts, Mintz went a perfect two-for-two.

“I was taking what they gave me,” Mintz said. “They were playing a lot of drop coverage, so I was taking what they offered. I think we let them bait us into a lot of tough midrange shots. I’ll definitely try to take more threes in the future, but I still want to get everyone involved as well.”

Two-way player Lester Quinones made his debut for the team, leading in scoring with 30 points. He shot 9-21 from the field and 2-7 from three, which aren’t the most efficient numbers, but those will improve over time.

Sixers second-round pick Adem Bona, who was recently assigned to Delaware, also made his debut and started the game. He finished with 14 points and nine rebounds. He got lost on defense a few times and held on to the ball a bit too long, but those issues should improve with experience.

“He played okay,” Longabardi said. “I think he was a little rusty. He hasn’t played in a game for a while, so tonight was for getting back into it. I think that will help.”

The team will try to pick up their first win on Saturday against the Greensboro Swarm. They will need strong contributions from Bona and Quinones to win. 

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