FARMINGTON — Most of the current Mt. Blue High School football players didn’t grow up going to games and dreaming about playing defense.

With apologies to Jordan Stevens, the Mt. Blue graduate who grew into the University of Maine’s defensive captain and attended two professional football camps this past summer, the Cougars are closely identified with offense.

Operating out of some variation of the run-and-shoot or spread attack since 1995, Mt. Blue has produced one Fitzpatrick Trophy winner at quarterback (Dustin Ireland) and a finalist at receiver (Cole Parlin). When you think of the blue-and-gold, you probably picture a team adept at scoring points, not preventing them.

That the Cougars are 3-0 for the first time since winning the Pine Tree Conference title since 2005 isn’t a shock. But being there while riding the crest of back-to-back shutouts? That’s new.

“I’d say that defense has definitely been our key so far,” said senior linebacker Colten Miranda. “We’ve played good defense, shut a couple of teams out, but we’re not satisfied. We’re going to get better every week.”

Numbers have been the Cougars’ best friend, and that doesn’t merely mean the zero on Oxford Hills and Mt. Ararat’s side of the scoreboard the last two Fridays.

Mt. Blue coach Gary Parlin would tell you that the magic number for the Cougars’ defense is three, as in the number of starters who are forced into double duty after playing every down on offense.

Defensive back/receivers Cam Sennick and Eric Berry and tight end/defensive end Ethan Kyes are the only two-way starters.

That’s a stark change from recent years, when the ranks have been noticeably thinner.

“We’ve got good linemen, and we’ve got depth in the line. So we’re keeping guys fresh,” Parlin said. “We really feel like that was one of the differences in the Messalonskee game. They have excellent line play, but most of those guys go both ways.”

Messalonskee’s deliberate, persistent double wing offense churned out two long touchdown drives in the season-opener at Mt. Blue.

Shawn Keach’s field goal in the final minute hoisted the Cougars to a 15-12 victory. They’ve served up eight consecutive shutout quarters since, punctuated by a goal-line stand last week at Mt. Ararat.

“We had a lot of returning starters this year, and our backups are all juniors, so we have strong backups too,” Kyes said. “We have a lot of athletic guys up front who play multiple sports and can do anything.”

Kyes is arguably the Cougars’ defensive MVP through the first three weeks, sacking opposing quarterbackls four times.

He shares the line with seniors Matt Archer, Nick Luker and Adam Lewia and junior Nick Searles.

“In practice we all come together and know our assignments, and then in the games we do the exact same thing,” Searles said.

Miranda and Matt Davis are the team’s leading tacklers at linebacker. Brandon Cochran is an impact player in the middle.

As for the secondary, which was the Cougars’ youngest and most vulnerable area one year ago, Sennick has a pair of interceptions.

“A lot of the guys who were out there last year were a little over their head at times,” Parlin said. “We had three sophomore starters going up against Lawrence and Bangor. Now we’ve got experienced guys back there.

“Unfortunately for us we had injuries to our line at the beginning of last year. We didn’t have our full complement of players until Week 6. We beat Brewer, shut out Skowhegan here. At the end of the year we were playing really good defense.”

Had it not been for a fourth-quarter turnover, Mt. Blue might have upset top seed and eventual Eastern Class A champion Bangor in the PTC quarterfinals.

That momentum led to the Cougars’ best start in five years and their most significant home game since that ’05 season, tonight against Lawrence.

“I’d like to get three back-to-back shutouts,” Miranda said. “We know Lawrence is definitely going to be better than any of the three teams we’ve played this far. But I feel like we are playing better than we did before through the first three games. If we just continue to get better and better, we’ll get where we need to go.”

Kyes was more succinct and specific.

“We expect to win and go far in the playoffs,” he said.

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