They were almost perfect.
The 1971 Oxford Hills football team was within a minute and seven seconds remaining in their eleventh game, clinging nearly a whole half to a 16-12 lead before they missed being unbeaten.
They still wound up the stuff of local legends, a collection of mostly seniors who melded in a way that brought out dazzling performances and let the thousands who attended their weekly performances emerge hoping the season would not end.
Or would end the right way.
“The joy of what it did for the community is what I most remember,” Connie Fallon, widow of head coach Bob Fallon, said recently. “It seemed everybody was wrapped up in it.”
The thing was, nobody expected it. Not even Coach Fallon, really. And it got better, week after week. The coach had been at Oxford Hills a half-dozen seasons, winning more than he lost. An outstanding athlete at Stephens High (Rumford) and Springfield College, Fallon had spent three years coaching Mexico High, winning a state championship in Class C before coming to Oxford Hills.
But Mexico football players were usually big and bigger. Most looked 19-and-a-half years old and ready to go logging. They were closer to Fallon’s idea of football players and what football players did. Which was grind and play defense. He didn’t like throwing the ball because “three things can happen and two of them are bad.”
OH’s 1971 team was on the smallish to average size. Most of the starters were veterans, however, entering their fourth season of organized football. Their greatest strength was an uncoachable virtue, tremendous team speed.
The Vikings were joined by Morse High of Bath in moving to the Pine Tree Conference from the Seacoast Conference. Both were Class B, but the PTC was generally considered much stronger. It included Skowhegan and WInslow, both perennial powers and recent champions.
Backing up Coach Fallon on the sidelines and practice field were Norway native Fred Lovejoy, who spent three years as the placekicker for the University of Maine, and Carl Fitzgerald, another UMO line veteran.
Key starters were quarterback Brad Cummings along with running backs Larry Durgin, Reggie Olmstead and Peter Brown. The ends were a previous-season transfer (from Massachusetts), Billy Brooks, and Hal Edwards. Brooks, rangy and probably the team’s fastest player, was a surprise to Fallon.
“Billy played JV our junior year and was probably overlooked,” recalled Paul Ricci, the senior center. “He really came on our senior year.”
The tackles were seniors Ron Somers and Jerre Bryant, with junior guards Gary Cummings and Brad Stanley rounding out the offensive line. The placekicker who saw starter service was Dave Daniels.
Almost to a player, the offensive starters played both ways.
Although the preseason pundits, like Coach Fallon, were reluctant to predict a banner year for the Vikings in the new league, there were plenty of reasons to believe that something special was brewing. Successful August scrimmages at Class C Winthrop and Class A Westbrook, the latter a shutout win by three touchdowns, had local fans anxious for the home opener on Labor Day weekend, scheduled to be a “full dress” exhibition (scoreboard, referees, and regulation quarters) against a good Traip Academy team.
Bob Moorehead covered the 1971 Oxford Hills football team as a general assignment reporter for the Portland Press Herald and Maine Sunday Telegram. He later served the Guy Gannett newspapers as a sports editor, city editor, managing editor, and general manager. His coverage also appeared in the Advertiser Democrat. Paul Ricci and Brian Partridge (both OHHS Class of 1972) conceived the idea for this series and provided extensive research. Readers who would like to share any favorite memories or stories from the 1971 season are encouraged to E-Mail either of them at paulricci@hotmail.com or brianpartridge@comcast.net.
Comments are not available on this story.
Send questions/comments to the editors.
