Garrett Lake hopes to avoid Mount Blue’s “quarterback jinx” and lead a senior-dominated team to Eastern Class A glory.
By Randy Whitehouse
Staff Writer

FARMINGTON – Garrett Lake has suffered all the wisecracks kindly. He’s heard all the questions.

“So, what bone are you going to break?” more than one smart-aleck has asked the Mount Blue senior.

Lake takes all the barbs with good humor. He knows he’s in a tough position, some would even say a cursed position, as the Cougars’ starting quarterback when the 2003 season opens Saturday at Waterville.

“You always think about (injuries), but there’s nothing you can do about it. Just go out and play your hardest and hope for the best,” Lake said. “I really don’t believe (there’s a curse). I think it’s just a string of bad luck.”

Each of the last three seasons, the Cougars have had their No. 1 quarterback go down with a broken bone.

Marcus Corey was the first, breaking his hand in a scrimmage before the 2000 season even started.

Then came Foster Oakley, who tempted fate right up until the last game of the 2001 season, when he broke his leg on a freak play against Skowhegan.

Last year, Chelsea Allen broke his wrist in Week 4 against Cony.

The spate of injuries led head coach Gary Parlin to wonder aloud after Allen got injured whether he’d be able to trick anybody into taking snaps for the Cougars.

But Lake, who dreamed of playing quarterback at Mt. Blue ever since he was a youngster watching 1996 Fitzpatrick Trophy winner Dustin Ireland lead the Cougars, has reason to believe he can end the “jinx.”

“I’m not like those other quarterbacks,” he added. “They all used to run with the ball a lot. I’m more of a pocket guy. I have to beat you with my arm rather than my legs.”

Besides that, the 6-foot-3, 205-pound Lake has a talented veteran offensive line to protect him. He also has five games of varsity experience under his helmet from when he replaced Allen last year.

“It’s a lot different coming in having had a few starts under your belt rather than just coming in raw,” Lake said. “You know how to prepare a little more. You know what to expect and the speed of the game. The first couple of plays I was out there last year I was kind of shocked by how fast it was compared to the other levels of football.”

Lake was impressive as a junior. He completed seven-of-10 passes in relief of Allen in that Cony game and went on to throw for over 600 yards and five TDs for the season.

The five games Lake played not only taught him what to expect from varsity defenses but what he needed to do to be better prepared for it his senior season. During the off-season, he worked on improving his footwork and field vision, among other things.

“A few games last year I had bad mechanics and it was obvious,” Lake said. “I went to a QBR (quarterbacks and receivers) camp in New Jersey. That was pretty intense. I learned a lot about myself as a quarterback in terms of throwing and footwork and being a leader on the field.”

Like Allen and Oakley before him, Lake was called into emergency duty his junior year. Other than that, he’s taken a very different route to the starting job.

The tradition at Mt. Blue is for the coaching staff to identify their prospective varsity quarterbacks by eighth grade, then groom them with varsity experience on the defensive side of the ball before they finally take over under center by their senior season.

Lake hasn’t played any defense in high school. That he’s played any varsity football at all has surprised the man who is now his biggest supporter.

“He’s proven us wrong because when he was an eighth-grader, if someone had bet me $1,000 that he was going to be our quarterback, I would have taken that bet,” Parlin said. “He was big. He wasn’t quick. He wasn’t in shape. He took it upon himself after his sophomore year to get better. The light clicked on.”

rwhitehouse@sunjournal.com

Copy the Story Link