HERMON, Maine — The Old Town boys basketball team has picked up where it left off last winter, winning their first four games this season after surging to the Class B state championship on the final night of February.
But beyond the Coyotes resides a series of early season question marks within the Big East Conference, mysteries that include the Hermon Hawks and Foxcroft Academy Ponies.
Those teams squared off Wednesday night, and what ensued might become the norm for many games within the league this year — a low-scoring, tightly contested battle between teams seeking to establish a new identity.
Whether either team’s questions were answered in this matchup likely won’t be known for a couple of months, but Hermon had enough answers in the final three minutes of play to end the contest with eight unanswered points to secure a 46-39 victory over the Ponies.
“I think the potential is there for a lot of these games, but I think our league has been that way a lot in terms of knowing if you play well on a given night, you have a chance to win,” said Hermon coach Mark Reed, whose club is now 2-1. “But everybody can beat you on a given night, too.”
Both sides of that thought process nearly played out in this contest, as Hermon scored the game’s first seven points and led by 11 at halftime, only to have Foxcroft come all the way back behind junior forward Hunter Smith to take a 39-38 lead with 2:58 left in the fourth quarter on a 3-pointer by Drew Dankert — one of two freshmen to start for the Ponies.
But Hermon regrouped, with senior forward Joe Plummer banking in a jumper off a Tim Verrill assist to give the Hawks back the lead. Two free throws by Tyler Beaton and a Connor Clukey layup ensued, giving Hermon a two-possession lead that Foxcroft couldn’t overcome.
“On the offensive end in the last two minutes we played young,” said Foxcroft coach Dave Carey, whose club dips to 1-3. “We knew what we wanted to do, we just didn’t do it.
“We played hard enough to win the game. We didn’t execute well enough to win the game.”
Plummer finished with 16 points and eight rebounds for a Hermon team that is seeking to replace the more than 20 points per game lost last June when Tyler Thayer graduated and took his basketball game to Maine Maritime Academy in Castine.
Clukey added 10 points and 11 rebounds for the Hawks — including eight points and 10 rebounds in the first half alone — to help Hermon build a 25-14 lead.
Smith, the Big East’s third-leading scorer a season ago and Foxcroft’s lone returning starter, finished the night with a game-high and hard-earned 17 points, including 13 after intermission. Senior center Sean Cody added nine points and 10 rebounds for the Ponies.
Foxcroft shot just 12 of 49 (24 percent) from the field.
“Defensively I thought we did a decent job of making it tough on Hunter,” said Reed. “We had possessions at times defensively that were pretty good. We have to do a better job of managing the game and understanding some things. but when you’ve got young kids out there making young kid mistakes, that’s just part of it.”
