Some of the Bonny Eagle seniors will be suiting up for their third Class A state championship game on Saturday when they take on Skowhegan at 6 p.m. at Fitzpatrick Stadium in Portland.
While the goal – another victory – remains the same, their roles have changed a lot in four years.
“A bunch of us got brought up as freshmen. Going from the freshman team to the varsity team is a big change,” said Scots senior linebacker Dayton McPherson, who’s gone from young sideline observer to veteran big-time playmaker. “(The coaches) want you practicing with the varsity team, getting smacked around by big seniors that outweigh you by 100, 150 pounds. I thought it prepared us well for becoming seniors four years later.”
Senior running back Josh Ruby smiled and laughed when he remembered back to that first day at varsity practice after getting the call-up as a frosh.
“You can’t even imagine the difference in intensity,’ Ruby said. “First time on the varsity team, going up against John Wiechman, Matt O’Donnell, Mike O’Donnell. From freshman year to now, it’s a very different intensity level. Going out there then, you’re afraid of all those people. Now as a senior, you’re thinking the freshmen are just as afraid of you.”
Josh Spearin, one of the state’s top two-way linemen who’s still deciding which Div. 1 college football program he’ll be a part of next season, remembers being in awe of the older guys.
“I always looked up at the players, thinking they were unbelievably better,” Spearin said.
Now it’s Spearin who inspires the awe, a nimble 6-foot-4, 300-pounder who dominates both sides of the line of scrimmage.
Under coach Kevin Cooper, Bonny Eagle football has become the standard by which others are measured in Maine. A win over Skowhegan (10-1) would give the Scots (9-2) their fourth Class A title in five years – a feat equal to the great Biddeford teams of the early 1990s.
Win or lose, the game will cap quite a run for the senior class.
“Playing for three state championships in four years is amazing,” McPherson said. “Some players in Maine have never gotten to play for one state championship. We’ve won two so far and we’re hoping to make it three this weekend.”
The opponent is a formidable – if unexpected – one. Skowhegan, after escaping with a 22-21 comeback win over Brunswick in the quarterfinals, took to the road to face No. 1 and previously undefeated Lawrence. The Indians controlled the trenches en route to a 30-22 win.
“I think Lawrence was the team everybody thought was going to come out of the East,” said Cooper. “Skowhegan really put it to them.”
Again on the road, Skowhegan kept Edward Little’s prolific passing attack off the scoreboard in a 20-0 win for the East title.
“They’re physical, they’re tough,” Cooper said after breaking down the Indians on film. “Their lines really come off the ball hard and try to take the battle to their opponent, so to speak. They don’t sit back and wait. They’re basic in what they do, but the few things they do, they do very well.”
Offensively, Skowhegan runs mostly out of the double-wing formation, with a bit of I-formation thrown in. Billy Clark gets the bulk of the carries, with over 2,100 yards and 28 touchdowns this season.
The Indians will try to chew up clock by running the ball, looking to keep the Bonny Eagle offense off the field.
“They’re a pretty good, old-fashioned pound the ground offense,” McPherson said. “If they can get three yards on you, they’ll run the play over and over and over again on you until you can stop them. They’re a team that likes to be on schedule. If they can get two or three yards a play, that’s great for them. If we can put them behind schedule and stop them for a loss on a play or even give up only a yard, or force a fumble on a play, we can get the offense back out on the field to score points.”
While they’d rather grind it out, the Indians have shown the ability to score quickly if necessary.
“In their quarterfinal game, they were down by a couple scores with eight minutes left,” Cooper said. “You would think that a double-wing, ball control offense would have trouble putting points on the board quickly, but they managed to come back and win that game by one point.”
It’s the first state championship game for Skowhegan since 1989, when it lost to Marshwood, so the Scots will have the advantage in terms of experience. The evening time slot, however, will be a new one for Bonny Eagle in a championship game. The Class B state title between Morse and Mount Desert Island will kickoff at 11 a.m. at Fitzpatrick Stadium; the Class C game between Winthrop and John Bapst will follow at 2:30 p.m.
“We’ve won championships at 2:30. We’ve won one at 11. I guess this time we’re going to try to win one at 6,” McPherson said. “It’s going to be a challenge, but it doesn’t really matter what time it is. We’re going to come and we’re going to play our best game, no matter what.”
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