AUBURN – Mitch Snowe’s teammates and classmates at Edward Little High School told him the joke wasn’t funny.

Throughout the second week of January, Snowe moved without apparent difficulty around the hallways of his school and the lodge at Lost Valley.

Snowe knew the rumors were making the rounds, so he was careful to look everyone in the eye and not duck anyone’s questions. Those heart-to-heart conversations typically concluded with Snowe acknowledging that he was suffering from a torn anterior cruciate ligament in his knee.

And that’s when the talks took a comical turn.

“A lot of people didn’t believe me,” Snowe said. “People would tell me, ‘No, it isn’t or you wouldn’t be walking right now.'”

Oh, the ACL is definitely torn, and Snowe is absolutely walking.

Here’s the bigger deal, though: Snowe is still skiing, too, and competing at the highest level as he chases the biggest prizes on the Class A hill.

Although an ACL tear is almost always rightfully considered a season-ending or even career-threatening injury, there are exceptions, particularly in non-contact sports.

Snowe expects to finish his junior season with the help of a brace that artificially does the job of the damaged ligament by stabilizing the knee.

Undoubtedly hampered by his injury, Snowe still finished eighth Saturday in the slalom event of the KVAC Championships at Titcomb Mountain in Farmington. He was scheduled to tackle the giant slalom segment Monday at Black Mountain in preparation for the Class A championships there next week.

“The brace doesn’t bother me with giant slalom,” Snowe said. “It’s harder for me to get through the turns in the slalom.”

ACL injuries are often associated with sudden stops, in multiple senses of the word.

Football players sometimes sever the ligament in a helmet-to-knee collision. For a basketball player or a cheerleader, the tear could result from landing with the legs in an awkward, locked position after a rebound or a somersault.

That dangerous deceleration is frequently followed by a popping or grinding sensation in the knee and severe pain that prevents the athlete from standing up or subjecting the knee to any amount of body weight.

Snowe’s injury on January 12 was much less dramatic, declaring itself in the form of gnawing, dull pain that was more of a nuisance than it was excruciating. A specialist later diagnosed the problem and went over the possible solutions.

The injury didn’t come without a price. Nordic skiing is out of the question, so Snowe won’t be able to defend his state skimeister title. That’s the award presented in all three classes to the skier posting the best combined finish in GS, slalom, Nordic freestyle and skate at the state meet.

He’ll also see his season cut four weeks short while many of Maine’s best advance to Junior Olympic and Eastern High School championship competition in March.

“I’m opting not to do the select team if I qualify so I can have surgery in March and be ready for soccer season,” said Snowe, who also will miss the spring lacrosse campaign.

A full recovery from ACL reconstruction surgery requires a minimum of four months, and usually six or more. Many athletes must continue wearing a protective brace after the rehabilitation.

Snowe finished third in giant slalom and fourth in slalom at last year’s Class A championships. This year, in a bizarre winter that has seen record snowfall for most of us but less than optimum conditions on competition hills, Snowe won a pair of GS events before his injury.

“This is the first time anything like this has ever happened to me. I’ve been skiing since I was 3, and I’m 17 now,” he said. “I didn’t know what it was. I thought it was just a little bit of knee pain. When they told me I tore my ACL, naturally I was shocked.”

Not nearly as surprised as his teammates, though. And much less mystified than the competition still seeing Snowe’s name above their own on the speed charts, as if nothing ever happened.