DIXFIELD — Dirigo is heading back to Augusta.

The defending Class C boys basketball state champions defeated Madison 63-34 in a Class C South prelim game Wednesday night.

“I have been telling them the past few weeks that I knew we were going to play a prelim game,” Dirigo coach Cody St. Germain said. “I knew we needed to stay focused enough this season to give ourselves a chance. That’s all we can ask for, and give these guys under the bright lights of the Civic Center and give them a chance.”

Eight-seeded Dirigo (11-8) will take on No. 1 Mt. Abram (16-2) in a regional quarterfinal Monday at 8:30 p.m. at the Augusta Civic Center.

For most of this year’s Dirigo squad, it will be the first time they get on the Augusta court, with the team sporting eight seniors on last year’s championship squad.

“Last year, I played, I think, a minute-and-half against Monmouth and I had my first chance to score at Augusta and I bricked two free throws,” Dirigo’s Owen Smith said. “It’s really awesome (to return).”

Brady Philbrick paced the Cougars with 19 points while Smith had 11 and Nathaniel Wainwright had 10.

“Every single person who went into this game contributed significantly to our success tonight,” St. Germain said. “It was up and down the roster, everybody made plays and it’s about as good as a team win as I have seen in this program.”

Dirigo got on the board with back-to-back 3s from Philbrick to take a 6-2 lead.

“It feels great, it was very exciting, I like to bring a lot of energy,” Philbrick said. “If shooting is the way to do it for us, I will do it.”

The Bulldogs kept pace for a while, getting two free throws from Ethan Linkletter and Dayvn Nichols hitting a trey to cut the deficit to 12-7.

The Cougars went on a run near the end of the first quarter when Trevor Crosby hit a 3-pointer and Logan Timberlake had a layup to push the lead to 17-7 with 1:10 remaining in the frame.

Madison had a chance to cut into the lead but couldn’t and Dirigo led 17-7 heading into the second quarter.

“We missed some shots early and they are a team that plays off energy and we allowed them to play off energy,” Madison coach Jason Furbush said. “They hit some shots early and got their energy going. We didn’t recover from it.”

The Cougars hit a stretch where they couldn’t put the ball in the basket. However, the No. 9 Bulldogs (9-10) also struggled to score.

Dirigo was happy with its defensive game when the shots weren’t falling.

“Cody brought a great game plan defensively today,” Philbrick said. “We executed it well in practice and it correlated into the game. We shut down what they were going to do.”

Philbrick said the Bulldogs beat the Cougars with a lot of post-ups in the lone regular season game, which Madison won 51-49.

“That’s where we hung our hat today. I thought we played the best defense we played all year,” St. Germain said. “A lot of that transitioned into turnovers and points on the other end. We executed well with our game plan.”

Brayden Furbush cut the deficit to 17-9 to open the second-quarter scoring. Dirigo finally scored with 5:15 remaining when Wainwright had a bucket. A Smith basket and a Wainwright 3 pushed the lead to 24-9.

“Defensively, we have been OK at times this year,” Furbush said. “Offensively, we have had a problem scoring points. It reared its head tonight.”

Linkletter and Brode Strout sparked a six-point run for the Bulldogs to get within nine points. But Dirigo went into halftime with a 27-15 lead.

Strout led the Bulldogs with 11 points in the game.

The Cougars started the third on an 8-2 run and closed out the quarter with a 45-25 advantage. Smith had seven points in the quarter.

“I wouldn’t say they were the nails in the coffin, but it definitely helped,” Smith said of his third-quarter contributions. “Everybody played a good part today, not just one person.”

Dirigo started to put in reserves in the fourth quarter to help run the clock down.

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