Dog Pound

Usually when I go to a game at Lawrence it involves a trip past the Cindy Blodgett shrine, but last night was my first Bulldogs football game, the consensus Game of the Day between 4-0 Cony and 4-0 Lawrence.

Before the game, I was talking to Varsity Maine's Mike Mandell on the sideline, as media folks usually do, and he made the point that Lawrence would focus on the running game and maybe pass, but the key to the game might be Lawrence's Keegan Littlefield and his ability to cutback on runs. On the first drive, that looked prophetic. Littlefield ripped off a 37-yard TD run and the Bulldogs drew first blood.

But then Jackson Dangler found Miles Provost through the air.

And then again and suddenly Lawrence was up 21-0.

Cony finally got on the board to cut it to 2 scores and seemed to get a stop at the end of the half, but got flagged for pass interference and Lawrence scored on the extra play to make it 28-7. Live I thought the pass was uncatchable.

You make the call!

You knew Cony would come back. Their offense is just too good. Sure enough, they did. Jacob Fifield hauled in 3 touchdown passes from Drew Lindquist and Lindquist scored with his legs to bring Cony within a score, but on third and long, Provost came up with a huge sack to stop a drive before it could get started.

Lawrence needed a first down on 4th and 1 to put it away and Keegan Littlefield came through with a huge cutback run. Just like Mike Mandell said he would.

Read Mandell's writeup here.

Lawrence football outlasts Cony in battle of B North unbeatens

Jackson Dangler throws four touchdown passes, and the Bulldogs survive a late charge from the Rams to reach 5-0.

Centralmaine.comMike MandellStaff Writer

After the game, I caught up with Miles Provost.

In 8-Man, Orono won a thriller over Spruce Mountain.

Orono took the lead late when Cooper Brown found Eli Schaff for a touchdown on fourth down, but the Phoenix weren't done. Dylan Jewett's 34-yard strike to Levi Richards got Spruce within 2, but Jewett lost the ball on the conversion with 18 seconds left and Orono avoided overtime.

Speaking of overtime...Scarborough, who nearly knocked off South Portland a couple weeks ago, took Edward Little to double overtime. They're 0-5 now, but there's some signs of life.

Elsewhere

Estevao Lembissa ran for 2 touchdowns and took a kick return to the house as Biddeford knocked off Westbrook. The Tigers are officially a contender...Lucas Klehn ran for 4 scores and tossed 2 more as Bonny Eagle cruised...Freeport's Paul St. Pierre notched his 50th win in a victory over Morse...Ethan White ran for 5 touchdowns in Kennebunk's win over Gorham...Fin Minkel and Malachi Cusano connected on a trifecta of scores as Messo beat Fryeburg...OOB found their defense in the second half against Boothbay...Massabesic outlasted Noble...Toby Oufiero accounted for 4 touchdowns in Oxford Hills' win over Lewiston...SoPo scored three times in the second quarter to put away Sanford...Wells raced out to a 34-8 lead over Gardiner...Marshwood stayed perfect with a dominant win over Falmouth. Greg Castoras scored 4 times.

If there's one constant in life, it's that people will always look for ways to make money off you, but making money off your 4th grader's basketball dreams is a new kind of low.

I also get these emails. Lots of them. $175 to do video analysis of your 3rd grader's shooting form! But only if your kid is serious about getting better.

And it's not just Maine. Things are getting worse all over the country, in case you haven't noticed, and youth sports are no different.

You know the drill. Everyone is convinced their kid is going to be the next Cooper Flagg if they just get the right amount of help.

But it doesn't have to be like that.

Take, for example, Norway:

In the Norway sports system, no game scores are recorded and no standings are published until kids turn 11. Everyone knows which team is winning. That’s not the point. The emphasis is on something else entirely.

Meanwhile, Norwegian parents aren’t forced to pay excessive hotel prices at tournaments in a much-maligned practice called “pay to play.” Many pitch tents at the edge of the fields, and for lunch each day, eat shoulder-to-shoulder in a large gymnasium where volunteers ladle the same chicken stew in cardboard bowls for everyone.

And yet, Norway consistently out-performs much larger countries on a per-capita basis and has no shortage of high-end talent like Erling Haaland.

They (along with the other Scandinavian countries) also outrank us in wellbeing and happiness and, well, pretty much everything.

If only there was some clue as to why.

It's #1 vs #2 in the Power Rankings today when Portland heads south to take on Thornton Academy. And while 1 vs 2 sounds great, the Model has TA as a pretty big favorite because, well, there's a pretty big gap in DIRIGO between 1 and 2.

Which doesn't mean things are hopeless for Portland. Rather, this is the start of a stretch where the Bulldogs get to test themselves against the meat of their schedule.

They've been pretty dominant so far with a %Perfect of 89.8%, but they have played the easiest schedule in Class A. So how good are they? We don't know yet because they haven't been tested.

TA has played a harder schedule, with the Bedford game being a major wildcard, and they've got an even better %Perfect of 93.5%

They'll both face a nice test today in what could be a Gold Ball preview.

The rest of the Model's picks for today's games are after the jump.