It took a brief detour in Buffalo to figure it out, but Maine’s Brian Andre has learned that the old cliche is true: there is no place like home.

Andre starred at Valley High School, in Bingham, Maine, a team that reached 101 straight wins and six straight Maine State Championships in his tenure. All that success had people leading Andre away from the Black Bears and the America East, and toward Buffalo and the Mid-American Conference.

“I had a lot of pressure to come out of state,” Andre says. “A big reason I went to Buffalo was because people were like ‘Oh, you can do much better than Maine.’ But I’m definitely proud to be here in Maine now.”

He received sporadic playing time while at Buffalo, averaging 1.5 points during his sophomore season, before the desire to play more basketball after college and the failing health of his parents lured him to Orono.

“I decided to transfer so I could help my parents out,” Andre said. “Plus I wanted to play basketball further and I had a better playing opportunity at Maine.”

Two years later, Andre’s parents are doing much better and so are his chances of playing after college, as he has parlayed increased playing time into some impressive stats. He ranks second in the AE in offensive rebounds per game, with 2.6 and is eighth in blocked shots with .74 per game.

There’s also the benefit of being one of eight Pine Tree State natives on the squad.

“A lot of people follow us now because we have a lot of Maine kids on the team,” Andre said. “We’re the only Division I team in the state. I go to the grocery store and just hop around any store and people are like, ‘Oh, there’s Brian Andre.’”

He’s also 6 foot 9 inches, 310 pounds — a size you see on inside players in the MAC, but not necessarily in the America East.

“In the MAC there are more 7-footers and 6-foot-11 guys; the America East has the smaller guys,” Andre said. “Being one of the big guys in the league, I can take advantage of every opportunity I have. I feel like I can control the paint and help control the defensive areas.”

Playing in a guard-driven league does have its downfalls. Players tend to flop on big guys, drawing more offensive fouls than they would in a bigger conference.

“In the MAC it’s definitely more of a chest-up, you-know-I’m-gonna-play-you, not-flop-on-you-all-the-time [league],” he said. “This year I’ve seen a lot of guys flopping on me.”

Like his current team in the AE, Andre’s old team finished in last place in the MAC. But unlike his old team, no team wants to play the Black Bears. That’s because of upset road wins Maine scored over UMBC and Albany during the regular season.

“We practice so well,” Andre said. “We can’t figure out why it doesn’t always carry over to the games, but when it does come out it’s great.”

The upsets, especially the win over UMBC in which Andre had 14 points and five rebounds, have Maine going into the tournament as perhaps the most confident No. 9 seed ever.

“That’s the big thing that we’re looking forward to, a lot of teams are not gonna want to play us, especially UMBC,” Andre said.

It’s not the first-place Retrievers who scare Andre and the Black Bears — it’s the host Binghamton Bearcats he doesn’t want to face.

“We always seem to get smacked by Binghamton at that place,” he said. “Hopefully we won’t have to play them there.”

Brian Andre sounds off on the hardest place to play in the America East: Binghamton — They have a lot of fan support, and we got beat pretty good there the last two years.

The player he respects most in the America East: Emanuel Neto, Stony Brook — the big guy on Stony Brook. I talked to him when we played them, he’s got some good ability. He’s a good guy.