My colleagues Oakes and Pelletier and I held a three-way coin flip for who would write this week’s column, which is odd since Pelletier never writes on this page. Anyway, I lost. That means you did, too.

So here are some scattered musings about the semifinals, my favorite week of the football season, whether its high school, the pros or coll… oh that’s right, college football stinks.

• Why are the semifinals so great? Well, there’s more of everything — more games, more Cinderellas, more grudge matches, more great games — than in the conference finals. There are fewer teams that don’t belong within a Hail Mary of the playoffs and, therefore, fewer blowouts than in the quarterfinals. A lot of teams talk about winning a state title, but for many of them, the true prize is playing for the conference championship. Win your semifinal and anything is possible. The quarterfinals are the first taste of playoff football, but this is the week where it really feels like the playoffs, it really feels like there’s no tomorrow. Emotions being to reach a fever pitch, and the football is about as good as it gets.

• So, who are this year’s Cinderellas? Well, the most obvious choice is Brunswick, the No. 8 seed in the Pine Tree Conference. For the second time in as many years, the Dragons went to Fairfield and shocked unbeaten Lawrence. This time, though, they made the Bulldogs the first top seed to get knocked out of the first round since Bangor in 1999, and there were only four teams in the playoffs then, so what the Dragons pulled off was historic.

What’s more amazing is how head coach Dan Cooper has remade his backfield since star running back Dylan Walton went out for the season with a shoulder injury in the first meeting with Lewiston. He put in a new starter at quarterback, Ezra Drehobl, and turned the running game over to the tandem of Keith Kitchens and Jordan Rysdham, and now Brunswick playing its best football of the year.

Lewiston handled Brunswick easily back on Sept. 24, 28-12, but the Dragons were knocked for a loop losing Walton in that game. They are a much more confident team now. The Blue Devils should win this game based on talent, but they can’t go in thinking talent alone will get them to the finals, lest they want to join Lawrence and watch from the stands.

• Want another Cinderella? How about the No. 5 seed in Western C, the Oak Hill Raiders? Before the playoffs, coach Dave Wing talked about the importance of his team going into the second season on an upswing, and the Raiders looked like a team brimming with confidence in last Saturday’s 25-13 win on the road at No. 4 Traip.

The Raiders go into every game knowing they have the best running back on the field in Josh Allen, who is tougher to bring down than Tim Lincecum at a World Series party in San Francisco. With Cody DePuy and Joel Wells on hand to help out, the Raiders don’t have to wear him out to move the ball. The offensive line has improved greatly from the sieve that started the season and is a reflection of the physical back it blocks for. The offense as a whole is a reflection of Allen and quarterback Cam Morin, who has played with more poise since returning from his late-season benching.

The Raiders nearly knocked off Yarmouth in Week 2 before bowing to the Clippers, 20-15. That was a long time ago, but Oak Hill has played a much tougher schedule since then. Yarmouth’s speed presents a lot of problems, and the Clippers can be as explosive as any team in the state, averaging nearly 50 points per game. But nothing snuffs the fuse out on an explosive offense like a team that can grind out clock-killing drives. The Raiders can do that.

• We all agree it’s absurd for a three-way coin flip to determine the final two spots in Western B. So can we all agree that the only way it can be solved on the field under the current Campbell Conference format is using either point differential or total points as the first tiebreaker?  Well, no we can’t if everybody is going to scream our society is doomed anytime someone runs up the score on one of the conference weaklings, of which there are more than a few in the Campbell. Point differential between the tied teams does not solve this issue because how do you know whether the team you’re running the clock out on with a 42-13 lead in Week 1 won’t be breathing down your neck for the fourth and final playoff spot in Week 8 or 9?

• Playing Mountain Valley in the semifinals is a debatable reward for having your quarter land on the right side, but for a fledgling program like Falmouth, getting into the playoffs is vital to establishing a football program at a soccer school. The Falcons, of course, won’t show any mercy, regardless of how they feel about soccer.

• Speaking of the Falcons, naming their practice field in honor of Danny Garneau and having his father, Jeff, join the coaching staff this year pretty much sums up the Garneau family, the Falcons and head coach Jim Aylward. Total class.

• Congratulations to Edward Little coach Dave Sterling on being named the Pine Tree Conference’s Coach of the Year. The Eddies went from not having a coach less than a month before their first practice to being a team that no one wanted to face come playoff time. Sterling had a talented, dedicated, senior-laden team and a knowledgeable and experienced coaching staff to work with, but the Eddies needed a rudder. Sterling not only provided that, but built the defense into one of the best in the conference in a very short time.

• If Thompson Field isn’t packed to the parking lots with football fans on Saturday afternoon, then I will weep for high school football in central Maine. It’s the only show between Exits 53 and 185. It’s the two marquee programs of the last 16 years in the Campbell Conference Class C, Winthrop and Lisbon. It’s potentially for home field in the final (if my upset prediction in the other game comes true). And it’s potentially the last day game at Lisbon, which is working towards having lights installed for next season.

• Don’t blame me. I voted for Kodos.