The expansion and improvement projects at Lewiston High School’s Franklin Pasture athletic complex received a major boost Saturday night, with help from the entire school community.

Lewiston received a $25,000 grant from State Farm Insurance as part of the company’s “Celebrate My Drive” teen safe-driving promotion.

During October, more than 3,500 schools from around the country registered with the program, with over six million students completing a safe driving commitment contract. Lewiston finished among the top 100 schools.

Leading participants were eligible for several awards, including the grand prize of a Kelly Clarkson concert at their school. Grants of $25,000 and $100,000 also were awarded in the small and large school categories.

Lewiston was recognized as one of the top large schools in a category that included metropolitan high schools in Houston and Miami.

“This is truly huge news,” Lewiston athletic director Jason Fuller said. “We are the only high school in Maine that won this grant.”

Local State Farm agent Lisa Laliberte made the presentation between games of Saturday’s basketball doubleheader against Edward Little.

In addition to supporting further teen driving safety education in the community, the funds will be applied to the ongoing capital improvements at Franklin, which are slated to include artificial turf surfaces for the football and baseball fields.

Mid-winter meltdown

One week ago, the idea of not having ample snow or the sub-freezing temperatures needed to host a major Nordic skiing event would have been ludicrous.

Even then, when greeted with the idea that he wouldn’t have to worry about such matters this winter, for a change, Leavitt coach Dustin Williamson knew better.

“Mother Nature always throws me something the week of the Hornet Classic,” he said.

That feeling in Williamson’s bones proved prophetic. Two significant rain storms — the second accompanied by ice that made many of the state’s roads impassable — forced Leavitt to cancel its popular festival.

Given the time and participation involved, the event cannot be made up on a school day. And with Maranacook, Mountain Valley and Oxford Hills hosting their January crown jewel races the next three Saturdays, there is no available make-up date.

The January thaw is a terrible break for Leavitt and its ski boosters, who present the classic as one of their two major fundraising events each year.

It’s also nothing new.

“We had to work right up until the night before to make sure we had enough snow (to hold the race) last year,” Williamson said. “Then we had a stretch from the end of January through the first week of February where we lost all the snow. It’s tough when you’ve been training on snow all winter to go back to running, but sometimes that’s the reality.”

Playoff talk

The topic of the girls’ basketball tournament has come up a few times this season in Lewiston  team discussions.

That’s because the Blue Devils are flirting with a potential playoff spot, something Lewiston hasn’t done since 2005.

“We been talking about it since day one,” said Lewiston coach Mike Labonte. “We’ve been right on the edge. When you haven’t been in it for a long time, you think about it as a goal.”

Lewiston’s last tourney appearance was a prelim win at home against Hampden and then an Eastern A quarterfinal loss to Cony at the Bangor Auditorium. The Blue Devils were the No. 8 seed that year.

Lewiston is currently 2-8 but are in the ninth spot in Eastern A. That would be enough for a tourney berth. That’s despite two losses that came by a point in the final seconds against Brunswick and Mt. Blue — both games that could have bumped the Blue Devils up the standings considerably.

Lewiston has showed great improvement this season, despite still being a young squad. Starters Jenessa Talarico, Kristina Blais, Maegan Mathon, Laurianne Murphy and Brie Wilson now have enough seasoning to make them competitive with most teams in Eastern A.

“I tell the girls to look at all the teams in the league,” Labonte said. “Who can you really be afraid of? They’re not afraid of anybody. We just want to get there. If we can get there, I don’t think anybody is going to want anything to do with us.”

Growth spurt

The winning streak came to a halt Thursday for the Mt. Blue girls. The Cougars had won four straight before losing to Skowhegan. Still, the surge of wins was a good sign for a young Mt. Blue team.

“I felt pretty confident coming into this year,” said Mt. Blue coach Tom Philbrick, who graduated seven seniors from last year’s tourney team. “We can play. We’re just growing.”

Mt. Blue is currently 5-5 and in eighth in Eastern A. That’s despite only having one player back that saw ample time last year. Senior Miranda Nicely is the veteran on the club, but Addie Brinkman, Caitlin Kane, Emily Knowles and Kiana Thompson are adjusting to starting roles while Eryn Doiron leads a promising group that help spark things off the bench. Mt. Blue only has three seniors.

“We’ve got girls in roles they’ve never done,” Philbrick said. “Miranda’s the only one back that has any time at the varsity level.”

After starting the year 0-3, the Cougars have seen improvement and won five of their last seven games.

“We’re doing better as a team,” said Brinkman, a junior forward.  “We started off a little rough. We’re forming a better team. We hadn’t played together much, but we’re starting to work together and help each other and starting to work as a team.”

Fitting in, swimmingly

When Saint Dominic Academy swimming coach Marc Robitaille is asked about his favorite racers on the team, you might expect him to say his daughter, Nicole.

Her fellow veterans on the girls’ team, Ciara Ferguson and Emily Carney, certainly would be on the list. And probably brothers Mike and Matt Dempski on the boys’ side.

But with only 13 total swimmers on the team, it’s probably natural for the Saints’ coach to have a special place in his heart for the freshmen.

“The new swimmers are always my favorites. We have two freshman girls, Meagan D’Alessandro and Laura Dolci, and we were just so happy to get them,” Robitaille said. “When you experience losses, you wonder who’s going to be coming up.”

In addition to helping the Saints win the 400-yard freestyle relay in Friday’s home meet against Lewiston, D’Alessandro won the 100 breaststroke in personal-record time and finished third in her first try at the 200 freestyle.

Dolci scored key points in the 50 and 100 freestyle as well as a relay.

“Both of them have come from feeder teams through the YW. When these kids get to high school, they’ve already experienced competition. But it’s different when you step up to high school,” Robitaille said. “We’re trying to build the team and feel our way, but it’s nice to literally see them grow throughout the season.”

Knight watch

The Poland Regional High School boys’ track team opened its season with an impressive victory in an eight-team Western Maine Conference meet at the University of Southern Maine.

Scoring individual wins for the Knights were Evan Gallagher (junior 55 meters), Jagger Ware (junior 55 hurdles), the junior 4×200 relay, Cody Kostro (senior high jump) and Matt Rabasco (long jump).

Poland also cashed in a 2-3-4 finish by Tony Benedict, Kostro and Chase Thibault in the shot put and lined up the third, fourth and fifth-place distances behind Kostro in high jump. The end result was a 138-135 win over Fryeburg.

In the girls’ competition, Poland was fifth, with Greely taking top honors. Hope Kohtala won the high jump.

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