LEWISTON — Lewiston was playing with a new head coach and a quarterback in only his second game at the position, but the Blue Devils gave their home fans plenty to cheer about in a 27-0 victory over Mt. Blue on Saturday afternoon at Don Roux Field.

Interim coach Justin Bisson, who took the reins when Darren Hartley resigned Thursday, notched his first career win, and senior Donovan Jackson played a big role in that, accounting for all four Lewiston (1-3) touchdowns.

“He’s taken to that quarterback position really well,” Bisson said. “We really kind of threw him into that. It was one of those things we kind of wanted to do all summer, but we ended up going with (Kameron Caron) at the beginning. Donovan has stepped up and just been a leader. He’s a true professional at that quarterback position. He solidified our offense and the guys really respect him, they work hard for him.”

Jackson played QB last week in a 40-0 loss at Thornton Academy. It took him just one series to lead his team to a touchdown Saturday, a 5-yard TD pass to Eli Bigelow.

“It was nice. It was really nice,” Jackson said. “I’ve never done it before, you know, first time playing QB — I got put into it — but I just trusted myself, trusted my teammates, that’s how we got it.”

Lewiston’s 6-0 lead lasted until halftime, but both teams nearly found the end zone in the second quarter.

The Blue Devils were poised to punch it in again, but Caron, playing running back, was stuffed on fourth-and-goal from the 1-yard line midway through the period.

With 43 seconds left in the half, the Cougars (0-2) got the ball at their own 43. They quickly marched it down to the red zone thanks to junior quarterback Jayden Meader’s arm, but after dueling penalties gave Mt. Blue one last play at the 13-yard line, Meader’s pass to Chase Ranger was short of the goal line.

“It was an opportunity, absolutely. Any time you can flip the momentum that way is an opportunity,” Mt. Blue coach Scott Franzose said. “Didn’t take advantage of it. I think that was a huge key to what we didn’t do today, was just take advantage of a lot of opportunities.”

“Defensively, we kind of got a little lax on that (last drive),” Bisson said. “That was right before the half. We almost let them score but we were able to stop them. We just kind of told the kids that (the goal-line stand on offense) was one that we missed. We need to make that play. They picked it up. They came in the second half and they responded the way we wanted them to.”

Lewiston opened the second half with a touchdown drive, capped off by Jackson’s 2-yard scramble for a score after getting out of the grasp of a Mt. Blue defender. Abdirizak Abukar made the extra point for a 13-0 lead.

On Mt. Blue’s first play of the ensuing drive, junior running back Hayden Dippner went down with a gruesome injury after a 7-yard run. The game was delayed for more than 30 minutes as Dippner was cared for and taken away in an ambulance.

He had 17 yards on six carries before the injury.

“It’s unfortunate what happened to Hayden, he’s a great kid,” Franzose said. “He’s in the right place getting treatment, we’re with him, but (after the delay) we wanted to get back to playing football. Wanted to get loose and get back to the business of — I believe at that time we had (19 minutes) left, let’s go win a football game.”

Mt. Blue was forced to punt after four more plays, but did get the ball back when Isaac Wrigley intercepted Jackson.

The Cougars then went four-and-out in Lewiston territory.

Lewiston responded with a scoring drive into the fourth quarter, with Jackson scrambling in from 6 yards out, then finding Ethan Campbell for a two-point conversion.

Jackson and Campbell connected for 27 yards on the Blue Devils’ next drive to round out the scoring.

Jackson finished 11-of-15 passing for 103 yards and added 114 yards on 14 carries. Caron ran 15 times for 94 yards.

Meader was 11-for-22 passing for 121 yards. The Cougars were held to 57 yards on the ground.

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