STANDISH —Eric Bolduc trotted out to the mound with two out in the seventh inning of Tuesday’s Western C baseball championship and, at first glance, the Dirigo catcher appeared to engage in a little premature celebration.

But Bolduc merely shook pitcher Arik Fenstermacher’s hand and embraced him with a couple of back taps to provide encouragement that would lead to yet more hardware in Dirigo’s trophy case.

“One more,” Bolduc said. “We got this.”

Fenstermacher knows how to take orders from his catcher. He needed just one more pitch to clinch the Cougars’ first regional baseball title in school history while simultaneously helping himself and some of his teammates reach some rarefied air.

Dirigo will face Eastern Maine champion Calais Saturday (5 p.m., St. Joseph’s College) with its sights set on the first baseball title in school history. Eight of the players who will be in the Dirigo dugout Saturday will be part of their third state championship game in the last seven months — seniors Bolduc, Tyler Chiasson, Dave Guildford and Cliff Turner, juniors Fenstermacher and Spencer Ross, and sophomores Jake Dowland and Ben Holmes.

Last fall, the Cougars won their first football state championship by knocking off Foxcroft Academy at Fitzpatrick Stadium. In March, they fell one win short of the third basketball Gold Ball in the school’s annals, bowing to Washington Academy in the title game.

Playing for a state championship in football, basketball and baseball in the same school year is a rarity in Maine high school sports, but it’s been on some of the Cougars’ checklist for a while.

“That was our goal. It really was. All the way up through high school,” Chiasson said. “My buddies and I talked about it — we’re going to three state championships.”

“We talked about winning all three …,” he added, “but two-for-three ain’t bad.”

No Class C team has ever matched Dirigo’s trifecta. Only two schools have done it since 1970 —Bangor in 1995-96 in the and Lawrence in 1988-89.

Between the three sports in 2009-10, Dirigo has compiled a 47-6 record, including the 17-2 mark they will take into Saturday.

Not too many people in Canton, Carthage, Dixfield and Peru are surprised, least of all the athletes. From the youth level on up, they have been used to winning and used to winning with each other

“You can’t say enough about the year that all of the athletes have had, but especially the seniors,” Dirigo baseball coach Dave Lafleur said. “To have the year that they had and to go to three state championship games is truly remarkable and says a lot about who they are.”

On the list of what it takes to win, the Cougars have a lot of check marks. Some of those check points are beyond their control, things like their environment. But they appreciate the good fortune they’ve had in those areas.

“It shows a lot of dedication from the coaches in all of our sports,” said Fenstermacher, a guard in football, forward in basketball and pitcher/outfielder in baseball. “And it shows that the town that we live in, we’re good.”

Dedication and pride — check and check.

“Really, when it comes down to it, they’re just great athletes,”Lafleur said. “They’ve got great attitudes. They’ve got good work ethic, because they’re in the gym all the time. They run a lot in practice. They complain a little bit, but they do it.”

Talent — check.

“You can see it in their eyes, you can see it in their faces, when they’re running, the effort is there,” he added. “They’re putting forth the extra effort because they want it. They’re hungry.”

Hunger — check.

Something else Lafleur saw in their eyes in Tuesday’s regional final win over St. Dom’s was a confidence and the kind of repose derived from having been there a few times before.

“They were probably more calm than the coach was,” Dave Lafleur said.

Experience — check.

Experience has certainly served the Cougars well. They don’t just know how to deal with the pressure of championship games emotionally and mentally. They even know when to draw on their experience in the other sports.

Case in point, a key play in the seventh inning where Chiasson tagged out a St. Dom’s runner trying to take third base.

“I kind of did one of my football blocks, you know?” said a grinning Chiasson, whose athletic resume this year includes being a running back/defensive end, point guard and third baseman. “I was, like, ‘You’re not getting to the bag.'”

Killer instinct — check.

Dedication, pride, talent, hunger, experience, killer instinct. If the Cougars put all those together with the pitching, hitting and defense that has also gotten them here, their will be an interesting debate in the Western Foothills — Which is better, winning three regional titles or two state titles?