By Justin Pelletier,Staff Writer

NEWRY – Friday was a day of redemption for the girls’ team at the Class C state Alpine skiing championships at Sunday River.

Madawaska, edged last year by Freeport, was on a mission to recapture its title.

Livermore Falls had a score to settle as well after losing a skier to injury and tumbling into third place through the giant slalom.

The Freeport girls, meanwhile, could well have started to pack up their belongings after the first slalom run Friday, but they, too, hung on.

Madawaska was the biggest story, though. The Owls, paced by Jessica Ayotte in second place, Kaitlyn Pelletier in third, Jade St. Pierre in fourth and Kassie Levesque in sixth, reclaimed the Class C Alpine title with a dominating performance over two days. Madawaska finished with 35 total points, better than second-place Freeport by 42 and third-place Livermore Falls by 51.

“We’ve got three seniors that have been together since they were 8-years-old,” said Madawaska coach Rick Pelletier. “Anytime you have a race in the slalom, you just never know what’s going to happen, but they all went out there and skied hard. The girls were all hungry to see who could finish first, but after such a good first run they put personal aside and raced for the team. We went into safe mode and played it right.”

Ayotte placed first in Thursday’s giant slalom and second Friday. She felt like she could have gone after the win, but decided to stay back and deliver a quality finish time for the team’s sake.

“That’s the whole point of this sport,” said Ayotte. “It’s not an individual thing, but a team thing, and there are times that you just can’t go all out. That we did this, this is unbelievable.”

Finishing ahead of Ayotte and helping her team to a second place finish in the slalom was Tricia Richard of Livermore Falls. Richard’s first run of 39.80 seconds was second to Kaitlyn Pelletier’s, and her second (37.87) was No. 2 behind Morgan Weimar of Freeport, but added together, Richard bested Ayotte by more than half a second.

“The second run there were less hairpins and clutches,” said Richard of her blazing second run. “It was a bit easier. There were more swing gates. Coming in I was thinking maybe the top 10, but after the first run I knew I wanted to go for the top spot. I knew I could win it.”

The Andies as a team recaptured a consistency that disappeared when they lost a skier to injury midway through the giant slalom Thursday, and through the first run had defeated Freeport so handily, second in the Alpine combined behind Madawaska was nearly at hand.

“Everyone skied well today,” said Livermore coach Jeff Marceau. “Today we had to go in and focus and try to put what happened (Thursday) behind us. They did well. They did very well.”

Freeport, meanwhile, seemed to be down and out following the first run. Three of their six skier either fell of missed a gate and had to hike back, losing several seconds.

And then came run No. 2.

Weimar ripped off a 36.80-second run, the best of all skiers in the second run, and jumped from 22nd place into 10th. Nicole Moore followed close with the third-best second run in 38.08, moving from 33rd into 18th. Those 27 points helped the Falcons to hold off the Andies for second overall.

“I was like we had nothing to lose,” said Moore. “The second course was concise. it was a lot easier and we all took advantage of it.”

“We were all more comfortable,” added Weimar. “I think we choked a bit earlier because we were so nervous, but we were more relaxed in the second.”

With 163 points, Fort Kent took fourth in the Alpine competition, while John Bapst rounded out the top five with 186.

Whitney McDaniel, Cassandra Purrington and Ashley McDaniel all finished in the top 20 for Livermore.

In the overall competition, through three of four events, Freeport holds a 132-158 advantage over Madawaska, with Livermore Falls in third with 186. Livermore defeated Madawaska by 23 in Thursday’s freestyle race, while Freeport outperformed both schools by a wide margin. Waynflete leads John Bapst 42-48 in the race for the team Nordic championship.