The Maine Red Claws have three players with NBA experience. None suited up Sunday.
The Boston Celtics summoned Kadeem Allen to the NBA. And Jabari Bird (back) and Anthony Bennett (foot) weren’t quite ready to return, leaving the Claws two men short of a full active roster.
As it turned out, eight was enough.
Trey Davis scored 31 points and the Red Claws overcame the season’s first ejection of Coach Brandon Bailey to beat the Long Island Nets 109-100 before a sellout crowd of 2,417 at the Portland Expo.
Trailing by seven after one quarter, the Claws (16-15) surged to a 10-point halftime lead and went up 62-49 when Devin Williams opened the third with a three-point play.
The Nets (18-14), coached by former Red Claws and Celtics assistant Ronald Nored, came to town with a four-game winning streak that included a 120-111 victory over Maine at home Tuesday. They pulled even at 88 after the second of two technical fouls called on Bailey early in the fourth quarter and went ahead 90-88 on a subsequent fast-break layup by Shannon Scott.
L.J. Peak then sparked a 14-2 run for the Red Claws, whose decisive stretch included a 3-pointer from Vitto Brown, who was traded to Maine from Agua Caliente last week.
Peak finished with 20 points and eight rebounds. Brown came off the bench for 16 and eight. Williams had 17 points and 12 rebounds.
“We’ve been undermanned a lot this year,” Bailey said. “That’s just kind of the nature of this league. We’re not just going out there to play. We’re going out to win.”
Assistant coach Alex Barlow, whose college playing career at Butler overlapped with Nored for one year, took over from Bailey for the final 8:53.
“I just kept calling the plays we had been running and we found a little bit of rhythm,” Barlow said. “The guys did a great job executing them, of making the right play, making the right pass and we made some big shots down the stretch.”
Milton Doyle led Long Island with 28 points.
The Red Claws, who play seven of their next eight games on the road, return Feb. 10 to the Expo.
Glenn Jordan can be contacted at 791-6425 or
Twitter: GlennJordanPPH
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