Maine’s Joe Fagnano had his worst start as a college quarterback last week against Delaware, completing just 10 of 23 passes for 61 yards. “It falls on me to get the offense rolling,” he says. Ronnie Gillis photo

It’s all pretty simple for the University of Maine football team.

In order to move forward from last week’s 37-0 opening loss at Delaware, the Black Bears have to get “back to the brand of football that we play.”

Maine did little right last week, especially on offense (just 112 yards of total offense) and special teams (two muffed punts and a kick return for a touchdown), and needs to regroup quickly for Saturday’s game against Albany at Alfond Stadium in Orono. The Colonial Athletic Association spring season is only six games and a second loss won’t help playoff hopes.

“We’re not looking at it that way,” Coach Nick Charlton said during a Zoom call with reporters Wednesday. “You go down that track and that’s when you start overthinking things. Our guys know, especially with the tighter schedule, that we need to win these games.

“But that would be true in a 12-game (fall) schedule instead of a six-game schedule. We’re here to win. And like I told the guys after the game Saturday, we still have everything in front of us. We just need to play good football. We need to worry about us.”

Quarterback Joe Fagnano had his worst start as a college quarterback completing just 10 of 23 passes for 61 yards. He said the Black Bears need to put the Delaware game behind them.

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“We can let that game define us,” Fagnano said, “or we can play like we know how to play. We weren’t playing Maine football.

“It’s about getting back to what we know and that’s running the football and spreading the field.”

Fagnano admitted that “I didn’t execute to my level of play” against Delaware and said that has to change. “It falls on me to get the offense rolling to begin with,” he said during the Zoom call. “Getting on the same page with my receivers, that falls on me.”

Charlton said it wasn’t just one person who didn’t play well against Delaware. Playing better is really about fundamentals, he said, something the team has stressed this week in practice.

“It’s the little things, fundamentals,” said Charlton. “Special teams, making sure that operation is clean … Offensively, it’s doing the job. We score points here and we didn’t do that the other day.

“We’re looking forward to getting back to the brand of football that we play.”

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Albany is coming off a 24-20 win at New Hampshire and looked impressive doing it, as quarterback Jeff Undercuffler threw for 192 yards and three touchdowns.

But, again, Charlton said the focus is getting back to playing Maine’s style of football, which means running the ball effectively, making the catches down field and shutting down the opponent’s running game.

“It’s about us,” said Charlton. “We have an understanding of Albany and they have an understanding of us. But it’s really going to be about taking care of us, the fundamentals.”

Junior linebacker Adrian Otero, who led Maine with 11 tackles in the opener, refused to use the 15-month layoff between games as a reason for Maine’s struggles against Delaware. He said any mistakes that were made now have to be cleaned up.

“Watching film, we know our mistakes now,” said Otero. “We know our roles and we will play better this week.”

NOTES: Charlton said the starting left guard Tyler Royal will be out for the rest of the spring season “and indefinitely” with a knee injury suffered in the third quarter of Saturday’s loss – an injury that will require surgery. He will be replaced by Shawn Page, a 6-foot-3, 290-pound grad student transfer from Bloomsburg University. Charlton said Royal’s loss is significant. He was a returning starter at the position. … Maine will be playing at home for the first time since Nov. 16, 2019, a 34-30 win over Rhode Island.


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