Football: Lewiston powers past Mt. Blue

LEWISTON — The talk throughout the week for the Lewiston football team was about trusting one another, finishing and dominating, head coach Jason Versey said.

“And that means just dominating the next play. Not necessarily dominating the (other) team, but dominating the next play,” Versey said. “Competing against yourself every play. And I think our kids did that.”

The Blue Devils certainly did dominate on the turf at Don Roux Field on Friday, powering their way past Mt. Blue 35-7.

Lewiston (3-4) outgained the Cougars 465 yards to 131. That disparity was even more glaring in the respective ground games, with the Blue Devils rushing for 441 yards to Mt. Blue’s 14.

“You know, 100 percent props have to go to the big guys up front. That game doesn’t go the way it did without them,” Lewiston junior quarterback Jeffrey Randall said. “So props to them. Running backs got north, we did our job. We made the right calls, made the right plays, and today went our way.”

Randall ran 11 times for 154 yards and three touchdowns, and only passed the ball eight times, completing three of them for 24 yards.

Running backs Jayden Sands and Tafari Corson-James also went over the century mark, Sands carrying the ball 20 times for 157 yards and the Blue Devils’ first score, and Corson-James adding 11 carries for 136 yards and the final touchdown.

Lewiston’s Jayden Sands jumps to catch a pass while under pressure from Mt. Blue’s Dane Cousineau during Friday’s game in Lewiston. Lewiston’s Ryker Paradis, back, is nearby. Andree Kehn/Sun Journal

“I think it says a lot about our offensive line, and what we were able to do with those guys doing all that they did to let that happen,” Versey said. “If you’ve got three running backs with over 100 yards each, I mean, that’s a huge testament to our offensive line. And, actually, it’s great confidence for our running backs, to be able to grind.”

Sands opened the scoring with a 59-yard touchdown run on Lewiston’s second drive, and Corson-James kicked the extra point for a 7-0 lead.

Randall ran it in from 11 yards out on the second play of the second quarter, but a blocked extra point kept it 13-0.

The Cougars’ offense went three-and-out on each of their three drives of the first quarter and finished the period with minus-1 yard of offense.

Two more three-and-outs followed in the second quarter before Mt. Blue finally put a scoring drive together. Gary Hawkins completed all four of his passes on the drive, capped by a 19-yard loft to Trey Bailey in the end zone for a touchdown. Warren Allen’s extra point drew the Cougars to within 13-7 late in the first half.

“We didn’t want to pass the ball, but credit to Lewiston. The defense that they were playing, they basically forced us into that,” Mt. Blue coach Matt Friedman said. “And so, yeah, Gary was doing a good job. We were starting to figure out a few things, and then when he went down (later in the second quarter) it was kind of back to the drawing board there.”

Randall grabbed momentum right back for the Blue Devils on the next play, picking up a dropped snap and running through a big hole up the middle and away from everyone else for a 68-yard touchdown run.

“Well, fumbled snap at the beginning is not what you hope for, but you got to finish the play till the whistle blows,” Randall said. “So just get forward, get north, get as many yards as you can, and it turned out good for us.”

Harkins went down on the Cougars’ next drive when he was injured after being sacked on a fourth-and-long play. He finished 8 of 15 for 102 yards.

“It was unfortunate — we hope the Mt. Blue quarterback is OK, I know he went out with a concussion, so our thoughts and prayers for him,” Versey said. “But I think overall we had a game plan to manage no matter who played quarterback.”

Klay Dunning took over for Harkins and completed 3 of 9 passes for 15 yards.

“Our defensive coordinator, Bob Chaisson, had a great game plan against Mt. Blue,” Versey said. “We did run a lot of man, and in the right situations we made the right calls.”

Friedman said the Mt. Blue coaching staff tried to come up with some ideas at halftime for what could be successful on offense, but the Blue Devils all but quashed those ideas by playing keep-away. Randall capped the six-plus-minute opening drive of the third quarter with a 43-yard touchdown run. Corson-James added a 42-yard touchdown run in the fourth quarter.

The Cougars only had four possessions in the second half. The first two possessions went three-and-out, the third one ended in an unsuccessful fake-punt run on the 10th play, and the final possession lasted only play before a bad snap was recovered by the Blue Devils.

“When we’re not helping them offensively by having some drives, it just keeps our defense on the field for a really long time,” Friedman said. “And I thought my defense played really well tonight, but they just got worn down.”

Dunning and Bailey intercepted passes in the second quarter for the Mt. Blue defense, and Allen pounced on a bad Lewiston snap in the third.

After the Cougars’ bad snap in the final minute of the fourth quarter, Randall then took a knee for a rare negative-yardage play by Lewiston to end the game.

Versey said that while Friday night’s home win was good for his team moving forward, a road game at Windham next week and a rivalry matchup with Edward Little to end the regular season are tall tasks.

“We just got to keep grinding, keep pushing forward,” Versey said, fittingly.