BIDDEFORD, Maine -- Junior point guard Graham Safford (Hampden, Maine) poured in a career-high 32 points to lead the Bates College men's basketball team to a 72-54 victory over University of New England in a non-conference game played Saturday afternoon (Nov. 23) at the Harold Alfond Forum.

Safford filled up the stat sheet for the Bobcats (4-1), adding six rebounds and six assists to his game-high scoring output. He was 5 of 8 from beyond the arc and connected on 11 of 12 free throw attempts.

Bates also received a double-double from sophomore Mike Boornazian (Portland, Conn.), who scored 18 points and grabbed a game-best 13 boards. Senior Sean Cunningham (Amherst, Mass.) contributed eight points and seven rebounds.

UNE was paced by sophomore Devin Thompson (Winthrop, Mass.) and first-year Justin Pollard (Cape Neddick, Maine) with 11 points apiece. Senior Joshua Butler (Nantucket, Mass.) had a solid showing with nine points, nine rebounds, five steals and five blocked shots, while first-year William Abdul-Malak (Beirut, Lebanon) scored nine points off the bench.

Leading by two (31-29) at intermission, Bates slowly pulled away over the opening 10 minutes of the second half. Up six (46-40) with 13:18 remaining, Safford nailed back-to-backs treys to push the Bobcats' lead to double digits. The visitors, whose cushion would crest at 20 (63-43), were up by 10 or more points the rest of the way.

Despite shooting just 36.1 percent (22 of 61) for the afternoon, Bates held a sizeable margin in rebounds (48-27) and free throws made (22-12). Of the Bobcats' 48 caroms, 15 came on the offensive glass.

Both teams return to action Tuesday on the road. Bates heads down to Gorham to take on University of Southern Maine (7:30 p.m.), while UNE makes the trip to the Boston area to tackle Fisher College (6 p.m.).