One Dirigo junior has become the comeback kid with her play this season. Guard Jane Hebert missed most of last year with a knee injury. She’s returned better than ever and has helped put the Cougars among the top teams in Western C.

Her play has been especially impressive late in games recently. She helped spark a rally against Hall-Dale. She hit two 3-pointers in the final minutes to erase a 10-point deficit. Tricia Turner then finished off the rally with a basket and 42-39 win.

Then at Jay Tuesday, Hebert finished with 13 points. Her biggest shot was a 3-pointer in the closing seconds of overtime that lifted the Cougars to a 39-38 win over top-seeded Jay.

“It was like the only one I made all night,” said Hebert of her 3-pointer from the top of the key.

The stunning victory was reminiscent of a Jay win a few years back when Kaylie DeMillo drilled a fall-away jumper for three points to beat the Cougars in Dixfield. Hebert was a freshman on that Dirigo team and was glad to avenge that loss.

“It wasn’t an uncontested shot,” said Jay coach Chris Bessey. “Mallory (Bonnevie) was out there playing her. It was a tough shot. It wasn’t like she was wide open.”

The Cougars (10-4) ability to rally late is a positive thing for a young team showing great promise this season.

“I think that Hall-Dale game helped us out,” said Dirigo coach Reggie Weston. “We were down by 10 points, and we scored like seven points in the last minute and a half. Now they’ve got confidence that they can bring it back.”

Too close to call

The Mountain Valley Conference girls’ season has been so topsy turvy this season, a clear pairing for the conference championship game February 9 has yet to materialize. After Friday night, Jay and Mountain Valley are the only teams with just three losses, but Mt. Abram, Winthrop, Dirigo and Carrabec all have four.

In past years the final pairing has been clear cut, but this year may require some tie-breaking, if there remains more than two teams tied with the best record. In case of a tie, head-to-head records are factored in and then final Heal Points are used, if needed.

More like trailblazers

When you’re defending a Mountain Valley Conference championship and trying to climb the final rung on the ladder to a Class B state title, Emma James and Maria Parrett aren’t a bad place to start.

Mt. Abram High School has flaunted its one-two senior punch at two straight mid-week competitions, with James winning and Parrett finishing a solid second in the girls’ 5-kilometer classical events at Sugarloaf Outdoor Center and Black Mountain.

James won Wednesday’s race in Rumford by more than a minute, completing the course in 17 minutes, 43.7 seconds. Parrett pushed across the line in 18:47.9.

“Emma put in some serious time this summer,” said coach Buzz Bean, now in his 24th year guiding the Roadrunners’ Nordic program. “I tell kids, ‘Ski races are won in the summer.’ Emma’s a real competitor and always skis right at her limit.”

While the event is known as classical, Bean describes James’ style as “rock ‘n’ roll.” She is a two-time member of Maine’s Nordic squad at the Eastern High School Championships.

Parrett stayed in James’ tracks and finished only 16 seconds off the pace in the Carrabassett Valley event on Jan. 14.

“She has great quickness, balance and a motor,” Bean said of Parrett.

Nola Dixon (fifth), Lizzie Chenard (ninth) and Rachel Dennison (10th) gave the Roadrunners five skiers in the lead pack at Black Mountain.

Mt. Abram will seek its fourth consecutive league title at the upcoming MVCs. The Roadrunners were second at Class B states in 2008.

Last shall be first, they hope

Being the final team to lose in the inaugural season of sanctioned girls’ hockey makes Lewiston the answer to a trivia question. Of course, the Blue Devils would prefer to be the name that fills in the blank 20 years from now when someone inquires about who won the inaugural state championship.

Whether or not Lewiston earns that heartwarming distinction on Valentine’s Day largely depends upon how the Devils rebound from last Monday’s 4-2 loss to Biddeford. The Tigers showed signs of being the state’s hottest team, and it was they who captured the Tier I title in the final year of girls’ hockey as a club activity.

“I think we worked hard. I don’t know if we put in as much passion as we needed,” said Lewiston coach Ron Dumont. “That’s on me as a coach. I need to find a way to keep them motivated. Some days you don’t get the bounces. We had little lapses. I have ownership in this in that I need to get them prepared to compete all the way through.”

This week concludes the regular season. Girls’ hockey quarterfinals begin Wednesday, Feb. 4.

Unsung Eddies

A lot goes on behind the scenes to make a basketball team successful.

At Edward Little, it’s the work the bench puts in at practice that has helped put the Red Eddies atop the KVAC standings.

“I definitely want to give a lot of credit to the guys no one sees in a game — our second and third group,” Adams said.

“We had the best practice that we’ve had all year (Thursday) night,” Adams he added. “If it wasn’t for them, I don’t know if we’d have the toughness to come back after giving up an eight-point lead to Bangor (on Friday night).”

The unsung group includes sophomore Tim Mains, juniors Steven Giorgetti and Omar Abdi and seniors Tyler Gammon, Cody Goddard and Ethan Grund. Many of them are talented athletes who get their share of the glory in other sports but do the grunt work in basketball.

“We have all-state football players and all-state soccer players who don’t get a chance to play an awful lot who are good athletes and work us in practice every day,” Adams said. “A kid like (all-Sun Journal quarterback) Cody Goddard, who’s 6-2 and 220 pounds, athletic and strong, didn’t play basketball last year and thankfully came out this year. He works his butt off and gives (Sean) Daigle as good of a look defensively and offensively as he’ll see from anybody else. A guy like Ethan Grund, who’s an all-state soccer player, works his tail off and is a great captain.”

Adams also recognized the contributions of two reserves who have played significant minutes this year — sophomore Bo Leary and senior Dominique Bailey.

“Dominique’s athleticism is unmatched, and he’ll always do something different. He got some offensive rebounds (against Bangor) and when he got his hands up and defended the basketball at the point, we got, like, three steals in a row off passes to the wing because he can do things that no one else can do,” he said. “Bo did what he’s done all year. He’s going to give us four to six rebounds and four to six points every night. He’s a workhorse.”

Learned from the best

It’s no easy chore following in the footsteps of distance champion Mohamed Noor, but Lewiston’s Matt Driscoll is proving a worthy successor for the Lewiston High School indoor track and field team.

Driscoll captured both the mile and two-mile races for the Blue Devils in last Saturday’s weekly KVAC meet at Colby College in Waterville. His winning time in the mile was 4:37.64. Driscoll’s cracked the 10-minute barrier by more than eight seconds to complete the sweep.

Only Logan Price of Greely has run the two-mile faster in Maine this winter than Driscoll’s clip of 9:51:31.