By Kalle Oakes,Staff Writer
The Mt. Blue offensive line owes much of its success to its physical nature – a product of an offseason together in the weight room.

FARMINGTON – Some football coaches chatter incessantly about team unity until you wonder if even they believe it.

Gary Parlin, on the other hand, doesn’t mind a little dissension and dysfunction in the Mt. Blue High School camp, particularly when the family squabble involves two of his big, sometimes grouchy offensive linemen.

It means you can feel sorry for anyone in a white, road uniform and a three-point stance when No. 1 Mt. Blue (8-1) and No. 2 Skowhegan (7-2) collide for the Eastern Class A championship Friday night at Caldwell Field.

“They’re big, tough and athletic, and they’re a little bit nasty,” said Parlin, who’s in his 13th season as the Cougars’ head coach and unequivocally calls the sensational six of Tom Robinson, Matt Burnham, Jared Richards, Adam Wallace, Byron Staples and Eric Gilbert the best he’s ever coached.

That doesn’t mean practice is always a love-fest.

As Mt. Blue worked out inside its gymnasium Wednesday to escape the 35-degree temperatures and snowflakes outside, Parlin had to interrupt an agility drill to defuse a discussion between two of his biggest pupils that didn’t have anything to do with politics or dinner plans.

“They just started going at it,” Parlin said. “That’s good. They’re surly.”

Mt. Blue has unleashed individual linemen with either collegiate size or all-conference technique. This year’s group presents the total package across the board.

Gilbert and Robinson give the Cougars classic bookend tackles at 270 and 250 pounds, respectively. Staples and Burnham are the perfect, pulling guards for Mt. Blue’s ever-changing offensive sets.

Best of all, Mt. Blue has two centers catered to situational needs. Richards delivers traditional snaps to quarterback Mason Barker when he’s under center, while Wallace whips the ball to the senior signal-caller out of the shotgun.

True to their selfless nature, they claim to have no preference.

“We like to run whatever puts points on the board,” said Gilbert, a junior and the lone underclassman in the gang.

Lifting weights together all winter and summer gave the line its physical edge, according to Parlin. The exception was Wallace, who was the team’s second-string quarterback until the week leading up to Mt. Blue’s season-opener at Oxford Hills.

Sensing that Richards was frustrated by the long-distance snap, Parlin turned Barker’s understudy into his pitchman.

“He was the quarterback of our undefeated JV team last year,” offensive line coach Peter Franchetti said of Wallace. “He’s a natural athlete, a pitcher in baseball, and you can see a lot of parallels between being a pitcher and a shotgun center. You’re putting the ball in play.”

Robinson was another relatively late bloomer, but Parlin calls him arguably the premier offensive lineman of his tenure.

“He came in as a freshman and was afraid of his own shadow,” recalled Parlin. “He was this roly-poly kid. But one thing we always noticed with Tom is that he could squat and leg press a ton of weight. It was all in his legs.”

One of the offensive line’s greatest contributions to Mt. Blue’s best team since the 1980s is simply being there.

The unit never changed its approach when running backs Hazen Pingree and Jeff Davis and inner receiver Hal Robbins went down with significant injuries. Multi-talented Barker and rugged runner Mike Toothaker have enjoyed ample protection and space.

Together, the six have missed only one game.

“We’ve had injuries that would have been devastating to most teams,” Parlin said. “Having those guys healthy has been a key for us.”

Of course, the reality of being a blocker is that few fans or sportswriters notice whether you played or not.

“You get used to that,” said Burnham.

“The payoff for us,” added Staples, “comes at the end of the year.”

It comes in the form of the first home regional title game in school history. After years of getting out-muscled by behemoths from Bangor and skyscrapers from Skowhegan, Mt. Blue pushes around its weight with the best of them.

“We went to Bangor so many years where they just had the bigger, stronger kids,” Parlin said. “This year, we had the bigger, stronger kids.”

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