This business subjects us to tough questions. Sometimes we’re asking them, and sometimes we’re answering them.

The most challenging one that’s ever pitched to me — and by far, the one I hear most frequently — is “what’s your favorite sport to cover?”

I’ve perfected the copout answer: “Whichever one is in season.”

Lame, but outfitted in the truth. It’s the best part of the job, really. Every three months, a different game and a fresh supply of subjects come along and reinvigorate us.

High school football, soccer, field hockey, golf and cross country season starts this week. Once again this year, I’m the gridiron guy.

After logging more than 500 miles of highway and renewing acquaintances with 15 local football programs in seven days, you might think I’d be tired. Instead, I was left wondering how I could ever look forward to another sports season more than this one.

For starters, I get to watch Leavitt and Oak Hill defend their state championships with class and excellence.

There’s some train of thought that the Hornets will slide back to third or fourth place in Class C West after graduating 19 seniors from what was essentially a dream team. The mad scientist, coach Mike Hathaway, even hinted as much to me in his own words when I saw him in preseason.

He doesn’t have the world’s best poker face. Anybody who really believes that bologna hasn’t been paying attention to the prime rib Leavitt has served up the past five years, going 39-1 in the regular season.

No, you don’t simply “replace” the likes of Matt Powell, Levi Morin, Nate Coombs, Conor O’Malley, Nate Rousseau, Clay Rowland, Scott Sleeper and Tyler Chicoine, all of whom are either going about the business of preparing for their college football careers or excellence in the real world at this late stage of summer.

But the Hornets have a junior at quarterback, Levi Craig, who hasn’t let the ball touch the ground very often this preseason. There’s a veritable basketball starting five worth of 6-foot-3 and 6-foot-4 receivers capable of soaring heavenward and catching anything he throws their way. And slot receiver/wildcat quarterback/scat back/guy who defies all hyphens and labels Billy Bedard will be one of the most electrifying players in the state, class be dadgummed.

If you think that kind of talent, backed by that level of tradition, will fade quietly into the night, I can’t help you.

Of course, the good folks of Jay, Livermore and Livermore Falls rightly believe this is Spruce Mountain’s year to shine up the Gold Ball. There’s no debate that, if they remain healthy, quarterback Peter Theriault, flanker Deonte Ring and all-purpose back Matt Vigue are the top players at their position in the Campbell Conference. Having four-fifths of their offensive line intact won’t hurt either.

Nothing about the return to four enrollment classifications makes me happier than the development of that natural Leavitt-Spruce Mountain rivalry. It never shall replace the Jay Tigers and Livermore Falls Andies going facemask-to-facemask on the final Friday night of October, but the manner in which the two current, neighboring power are set up to win both this autumn and in the foreseeable future should furnish us fans something special.

Well, I should amend the first declaration of the preceding paragraph. If the pairing of the Phoenix and Hornets is 1A of the things I have loved about realignment, the creation of Class D West is 1B.

Small schools forever will be my favorite level of high school football. With apologies to my Class A and B friends, there is nothing more fun than watching any combination of Oak Hill, Lisbon, Dirigo and Winthrop/Monmouth duke it out.

It features kids from cookie-cutter communities. You couldn’t film “The Rivals 2” starring two of them, because the socioeconomic contrast is non-existent. They’re all dealing with the same issues, not the least of which are smaller numbers and shrinking budgets. It’s blue-collar football because it has to be.

And as the Raiders demonstrated last year, whichever school survives that gauntlet of a regional playoff is pretty well equipped to hoist the state championship trophy in Portland.

I’m excited to see how a no-nonsense, proven coach named Jim Hersom meshes with a no-nonsense, proven community named Dixfield. I don’t think I’m tiptoeing onto the thin branches by predicting immediate, rousing success.

Of course, there’s plenty of cause for excitement among the big boys, too.

Will anything this fall have more entertainment value than Lewiston’s Quintarian Brown playing quarterback? I doubt it. Brown’s sophomore and junior seasons taught us not to blink when he had the ball in his hands on a kick return or as a tailback. Now he gets it snapped directly to him on every play.

And it’s impossible not to be excited about Jim Aylward’s Route 2 relocation to Mt. Blue after coaching at Mountain Valley, well, forever. Two communities couldn’t be any better suited to Aylward’s style. It will be a blast watching the guy who built a powerful program inherit one that’s won consistently under only two other coaches for parts of five decades.

It will be rewarding to watch Edward Little and Oxford Hills attempt to turn their tireless offseason work into substantial gains against a brutal schedule in the “new” Class A configuration.

Ultimately, it’s just a joy watching a new group of young men excel in the game that instills more real-life lessons than any other I’ve encountered.

Athletes, coaches, fans and reporters alike are afforded the opportunity to experience the full range of emotions — not to mention all four seasons — in the span of a dozen weeks.

There’s nothing else like it.

Until the basketball tournament, anyway.

Kalle Oakes is a staff writer. His email is koakes@sunjournal.com. Follow him on Twitter @Oaksie72.

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