The Duke University women’s basketball team will play the University of Maine in Bangor on Nov. 15. That is the highlight of the Maine schedule, released Thursday.

The Black Bears will play only three nonconference home games – Toledo (Nov. 10) in the season opener, Duke and Brown (Dec. 8).

Duke, a national powerhouse, is coached by Brunswick native and former Maine coach Joanne Palombo McCallie. In McCallie’s eight seasons at Maine (1992-2000), she coached the Black Bears to six NCAA tournament appearances. Among her players were Amy Vachon, Maine’s head coach, and Cindy Blodgett, who coached Maine for four seasons. Palombo brought her Duke team to the Alfond Arena in Orono in 2009, when Blodgett was the Maine coach.

Maine now plays its home games at the Cross Insurance Center in Bangor.

Other highlights on the Black Bears’ non-conference schedule is a Nov. 24-25 tournament at Navy (where former Bowdoin coach Stefanie Pemper is the head coach) and games at North Carolina (Dec. 2) and North Carolina State (Dec. 15).

Maine’s America East Conference schedule begins Jan. 2 with a home game against New Hampshire.

SWIMMING

U.S. NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS: Katie Ledecky led all the way to win the 200-meter freestyle at Irvine, California, earning a second event to swim in Japan next month.

Ledecky touched first in 1 minute, 55.82 seconds, second-fastest in the world this year behind her top time of 1:54.66 she swam in June.

Ledecky qualified to swim the 200 free at the Pan Pacific championships in Tokyo in August, as well as the 800 free after winning it on Wednesday.

BASEBALL

EASTERN LEAGUE: Ryan McBroom hit a home run in the fourth inning and Trey Amburgey added one in the eighth as the Trenton Thunder topped the Portland Sea Dogs 8-1 at Trenton, New Jersey.

Portland scored in the ninth on Jhon Nunez’s RBI single.

Jeremy Rivera had three hits for Portland.

FENCING

SENIOR WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS: The U.S. women’s team made history, becoming the first American squad to win a senior world championship in the foil discipline.

The U.S. beat top-rated Italy 45-35 at Wuxi, China, claiming the crown that the Italians had won in four of the last five years.

CYCLING

TOUR DE FRANCE: A French team finally won a stage in this year’s race when Arnaud Demare of Groupama-FDJ comfortably claimed a sprint victory in the 18th stage.

After two grueling days in the Pyrenees, Geraint Thomas was able to enjoy his seventh day in the yellow jersey.

Thomas remained 1 minute, 59 seconds ahead of Tom Dumoulin with four-time champion Chris Froome third, 2:31 behind.