FARMINGTON – Mt. Blue High School used up its ode to fun-loving Fiesta Bowl champion Boise State with a little reverse trickery on a two-point conversion to tie Friday night’s football thriller with Messalonskee.

Faced with another chance to play for a deuce and the win in overtime, the Cougars went with their best odds and their best athlete and fell one foot short.

David Hash and Matthew Colby stopped Joe Gilbert one foot shy of the south end zone at Caldwell Field, giving the Eagles their first Pine Tree Conference Class A triumph of the season, 21-20.

“We don’t have a real strong kicking game. We went for two all night, and we were working on our two-point plays all week,” said Mt. Blue coach Gary Parlin. “You want the ball in your best player’s hands, and Joe’s our best player. I don’t know how short it was. When he turned up, I thought he was going to get in.”

Junior fullback Chris Reynolds delivered a crunching block to dismiss Dylan Foster from the play, but Messalonskee’e senior stoppers prevented the 6-foot-2, 180-pound Gilbert from leaning over the chalk.

The tackle was Hash’s eighth of the night to complement his 30 carries for 130 yards.

“It’s a lift right off our shoulders like you wouldn’t believe,” said Hash. “It was kind of a blow to everybody’s confidence going through those four games, but we showed we were getting battle-tested by those bigger teams.”

Messalonskee (1-4) lost to Bangor, Lewiston, Skowhegan and Oxford Hills – four teams that entered this weekend’s PTC slate with a combined 14-2 record. Mt. Blue (2-3) logged its previous victories over winless Brewer and Edward Little.

After the Eagles lost a combined six yards on their first two running plays in overtime, Hash regained all of it with a bruising surge off left tackle. On fourth-and-goal from the 10, sophomore quarterback Foster rolled to his right and found tight end Chris Pelletier in the end zone over Gilbert’s outstretched arms.

Pelletier followed his second TD grab of the night with his third extra point for a 21-14 lead.

Mt. Blue needed only two plays to answer, with Gilbert running a similar waggle and lofting an 8-yard strike to Bobby Duley (seven catches, 128 yards) past Foster’s reach.

“I was impressed with my kids. We hadn’t been finishing, and we did that tonight,” said Messalonskee coach Wes Littlefield.

Overtime mirrored the Eagles’ success on both sides of the line of scrimmage throughout regulation.

The Eagles’ double wing moved the ball at will on a pair of 12-play scoring drives. Phil Exner (22 carries, 101 yards) scored on a 4-yard run with 7:02 remaining in the first half. Pelletier’s kick granted Messalonskee a 7-6 halftime lead.

One fourth-down conversion and another third-down pickup extended Messalonskee’s march to christen the second half. With the Cougars’ defense understandably keyed on the run after consuming a heaping helping of Hash and Exner, Foster found Pelletier for a 19-yard TD connection with 5:55 to play in the third.

Foster completed all four of his pass attempts in the game for 60 yards. Riddled for 169 yards on the ground in the first half, the gang-tackling Cougars yielded only 84 rushing yards in the second half and OT.

“That’s double wing. You look for your first available lane,” said Parlin. “We worked on those lanes all week, and our linebackers Tim Lagasse and Derek Rowe did a much better job in the second half. They closed in and stayed behind the play.”

One week after shattering his school’s record for most passing yards in game, Gilbert was 15-of-20 for 175 yards. He also rushed for a team-high 82 yards, including TD runs of 39 yards in the first quarter and 3 yards in the third.

The second score brought Mt. Blue within 14-12. Gilbert drew the defense to the right on the two-point bid before sending Duley to the pylon in the opposite direction with a perfectly timed flip.

Turnovers halted two Mt. Blue drives inside the 10-yard line in the first half. Brandon Hall stripped and recovered the ball at the 6 after a 37-yard strike from Gilbert to Duley on the opening series. Exner picked up a ball that slipped out of Rowe’s hands at the 9 with 2:49 remaining in the second quarter.

“Our kids have been working hard all year and just haven’t gotten any breaks,” Littlefield said.

“Tonight we just kind of put things together.”