“He came back after we put the ball on the ground a couple times and said, ‘Coach, I won’t fumble. Just ride me.’ He’s talked a lot about the kind of player Jared Jensen was for Brunswick last year,” Oxford Hills coach Mark Soehren said. “Not comparing him to Jared, but Jared was a wrestler, Malik’s a wrestler, and that’s his mentality.”

Geiger’s numbers were as Jensenian as his relentless attitude — 39 carries, 237 yards, three touchdowns — in the Vikings’ 34-28 Eastern Class A football win over the Blue Devils.

The 5-foot-8, 169-pound junior saved his best for last, logging all seven carries on the game-winning drive after a Lewiston punt backed up Oxford Hills to its own 4. He concluded the march with a 69-yard jaunt in front of the Lewiston bench to break a 28-28 tie.

“We just had to dig deep,” Geiger said. “That’s what we did. We wanted it.”

Oxford Hills gave away a 28-13 halftime lead, losing three third-quarter fumbles before reverting to its better early habit of letting Geiger channel a bowling ball.

Geiger delivered a pair of 4-yard touchdown runs in the first quarter. Ethan Child exploded for scores of 34 and 14 yards in the second.

With star tailback Quintarian Brown sidelined most of the night by cramps, most of Lewiston’s strikes came through the air and on defense.

Eddie Emerson threw a pair of 25-yard TDs to Ben Howell. Jacob Kendall recovered a fumble for a score after a strip-sack by Nick Perreault.

Brown was held to nine carries for 90 yards, highlighted by an electrifying, 54-yard scoring scamper in the second quarter.

“Every time I called a play,  I didn’t know who was going to carry the ball because I wasn’t sure who was in the game and who wasn’t in the game,” Lewiston coach Bill County said. “It had to be at least nine or 10 guys that were in and out of the game the whole night, so it was really difficult making adjustments. Our continuity was off.”

Still, Lewiston forced an Oxford Hills punt with under three minutes to go and had a chance to steal the win.

Brown caught Emerson’s lateral to the left and unleashed a halfback option pass 50 yards on a dime. The Devils had a receiver open well behind the Vikings’ secondary, but the ball slipped through his fingers.

Two incomplete passes and Oxford Hills’ fourth sack of the night sealed it.

“When I saw that play, I thought, ‘Well, this could be interesting,'” Soehren said. “But when he dropped that I thought, ‘No, tonight’s our night.'”

Using a triple option with plenty of pistol characteristics, Oxford Hills prevailed without completing a pass.

The Vikings churned out 353 yards on the ground and limited the Devils to 103.

Ethan Edwards’ fumble recovery at the Lewiston 4 set up Geiger’s first touchdown. Jacob Spinhirn’s 32-yard punt return led to the second.

Lewiston’s early run of miscues continued when a long TD run by Brown was called back due to an illegal block in the back, but Emerson found Howell in the end zone on the next play.

Brown’s next one counted and gave Lewiston a brief 13-12 lead before Child collected his TDs in a span of under three minutes.

“We do have playmakers this year. There’s no question we do have speed on the outside,” Soehren said. “The stark difference this year in the second quarter was we hit the pitch. That’s why we run triple. It’s tough to cover that third phase.”

After a first half when precious little went wrong, Oxford Hills was nearly undone by a third quarter in which nothing went right.

The Vikings produced a net minus-14 yards in the period. Stone Colby supplemented the Perreault sack with two of his own and a fumble recovery. Kendall also scooped up a second loose ball.

Howell’s second TD catch of the night and an Emerson point-after kick tied it with 3:02 to go in the third.

“I thought we did a nice job at halftime shutting down the option. They came out and turned the ball over. We did a few things, and I thought it worked,” County said. “Then we decided to punt. We put them (inside the 5) and they go (96) yards for the winning touchdown. I thought we had something going out of the locker room. We tied it. The kids were excited. We kind of ran out of players more than anything.”

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