AUGUSTA – Pressure, injuries, mass graduations, possible coaching vacancies and complacency haven’t done Dirigo in. Why would anyone think that a couple of logistical changes to the Western Class C final would?

The time of this year’s final was changed, as was the seating arrangement. That could have been bad news for Dirigo. When you haven’t lost a Western Maine tournament game at the Augusta Civic Center in 11 years, you don’t want to change a thing.

Some teams might have taken the floor as the Cougars did just before 1 p.m. Saturday and noticed something wasn’t quite right, like the first time a husband walks into the living room after his wife has rearranged the furniture; there’s some initial discomfort, and if things start to go wrong, like when the remote doesn’t work from the new angle the sofa sits at, there’s panic.

There was no panic in the Cougars. A team that goes into every game with multiple streaks hanging over its head, that doesn’t want to be “the first one” to lose here in Augusta or to an MVC opponent, isn’t going to get rattled by things that are out of its control.

One reason the Cougars are so unflappable is because they keep a, uh, routine. Well, okay, let’s just call it what it is – they’re superstitious.

“That’s definitely one of the biggest factors, all of the superstitions that we have,” senior Alexa Kaubris said. “Like our cheering section was moved (by the MPA) to the other side of the floor and they still sat on the same side (behind the benches) anyway.”

“Before we play, we always put on Backstreet Boys in the locker room and just, like, sing and dance,” said senior Mallory Child. “We’re just really relaxed, and we have fun as a team, and then obviously we have our time where we start to concentrate on the game, like 10 minutes before warmups.”

Before you get the idea that the beat to “I Want it That Way” put the Cougars into a trance in the ACC locker room a half-hour before tipoff and made them forget about the pressure that they’re under, realize that there’s a lot more to their ability to focus than what I’ve been told is a boy band classic..

Pressure isn’t a four-letter word to Dirigo. Neither is “streak.” Ask the players or head coach Gavin Kane about all of the streaks the team has going for it, and you won’t be cut off at the pass by a gag order like the one a fella with the initials BB imposed on a certain football team to our south when it was on a streak last fall..

There’s plenty for Kane and his players to talk about when it comes to streaks – 141 straight MVC games won, 121 regular season victories, 11 conference titles, 37 of their last 38 games at ACC, including 33 consecutive Western Maine tournament games.

“We know it’s there, but we just concentrate on the game,” said Child. “We don’t really think about the pressure. We know we have a streak going on and we just want to continue working hard and continue the streak.”

But there’s also not a preoccupation with the numbers or the past. Occasional references are made, sure, but Kane isn’t telling his girls “Let’s go get win No. whatever” before every game.

“It’s not really one of the priorities of our coaching staff,” said senior Alexa Kaubris, who concluded a personal mini-streak by picking up her second straight tournament MVP yesterday. “They just want us to play every game as hard as we can and that’s what we focus on.”

“We don’t spend a lot of time talking about it,” Kane said, “but occasionally I’ll throw in a comment, like after we won the Mountain Valley Conference championship, that it was a goal we had and it’s always been something that we’ve been very, very proud of.”

Many, including Kane, thought the streaks might stop when eight seniors graduated from the Cougars’ last state championship team two years ago. But each player that has come along since then embraced the challenge of keeping the streaks going, even if it’s not a topic that gets discussed over the bubblegum pop blasting from a boom box in the locker room.

Kaubris and Brooke Weston, the two current seniors who played important roles on that team, were among the first to pick up the torch two years ago, and they are now 92-1 in their four-year careers and a win away from their third state championship. Clearly, Kane is proud of the way the girls hold up under the strain of trying to just maintain, let alone top, the legacies others have laid out before them.

“They don’t talk to me about it much. I don’t hear about it much, but I’ve got to believe that underneath, it’s there,” Kane said. “They do a pretty good job disguising it, but I know, we’ve heard little bits and pieces from them about not wanting to be the first group to lose a Western Maine ballgame.”

“These kids grew up coming to our ball games and watching Rebecca Fletcher and Nikki Dominiczak and those girls play, and they really wanted to be a part of this,” he added. “As the streak continued along, they took an awful lot of pride in what we’ve been able to accomplish.”

As they should. The Backstreet Boys will be playing the Bangor Auditorium locker room next week.