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 Kim Corbitt Named America East Player of Year
March 9, 2005 WEST HARTFORD, Conn. - Senior guard Kim Corbitt (Albany, N.Y./Colonie) of the University of Maine women's basketball team was named the 2005 America East Player of the Year and becomes the first Black Bear to repeat as the America East Defensive Player of the Year. Corbitt was also named to the All-America East first team with senior classmate Missy Traversi (Attleboro, Mass./Bishop Feehan). Sophomore Bracey Barker (Bar Harbor, Maine/Mount Desert Island) earned a third-team nod and Sharon Versyp was named Coach of the Year for the second time in three years. It also marks the third straight year a Black Bears has been named the conference Player of the Year. Corbitt is third on Maine's all-time career assist list with 436 career assists. This season, Corbitt has averaged 9.3 points, 3.4 rebounds, has dished out 120 assists and added 46 steals. She is ranked in the top-10 in four statistical categories in the conference, and is second in the league in assist/turnover ratio (1.82). It is only the eighth time a player from Maine was honored. Corbitt scored a career-high 21 points, all in the second half at Boston University on Feb. 2, 2005. Corbitt has dished out eight assists on two occasions this year, and grabbed a season-high 8 rebounds three times. Corbitt was named to the Dead River Company Classic All-Tournament team earlier this season. Traversi averaged 13.6 points this season and has scored in double figures in 24 out of 28 games played including the last 13 games. She became the 15th player in Maine history to score 1,000 points and currently has 1,115 points in her career and is 12th on the all-time career points list. Traversi was named the Dead River Company Classic MVP earlier this season, and honored as the America East Player of the Week the final week of the season. Barker averaged 12.1 points this season, 5.8 rebounds per game and had 25 blocks in the regular season. Barker has scored in double figures in 19 games played this season including the last eight games. Barker scored a career-high 26 points at Buffalo on Dec. 4, 2004 and grabbed a career-high 11 rebounds at UMBC on Jan. 26, 2005. Barker was honored as the America East Player of the Week on two different occasions this year. Maine returns to Chase Family Arena in Hartford for the 2005 Friendship Cottage Cheese America East Championship as the No. 1 seed. Maine will tip off at 2:30 p.m. on Thursday, March 10 against the winner of the No. 8 Boston University/No. 9 Stony Brook first round game. For America East Tournament ticket information, call the Hartford Ticket Office at 1-860-768-HAWK or visit www.americaeast.com
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