The meeting was coincidental, in Bar Harbor around the Fourth of July last summer.
And while most of the talk was about family and other interests, the conversation between Dave Morris and Chuck Nadeau inevitably turned to sports.
Teammates on Bangor High School’s undefeated 1985 Class A state championship baseball team, the two have continued to share their love of the sport as head coaches, Morris at his alma mater and Nadeau at Gorham High School.
“We’ve always tried to hook up for preseason games,” said Morris. “Chuck had done that with (former Bangor High coach) Jeff Fahey, but since I’ve taken over the weather’s never cooperated.
“But after we were done talking that day we said, ‘Well maybe we’ll meet up in a state championship game some time.’”
On Saturday, Morris and Nadeau will get that chance as Bangor seeks a record fifth consecutive state championship when it faces Gorham in the Class A state final at Saint Joseph’s College in Standish.
Game time is 1 p.m.
“Bangor’s been so successful that I’ve been used to getting the typical call before the state championship game every year looking for me to tell them about their opponent,” Nadeau said. “It’s funny, David hasn’t called yet this year.”
Personal connection
Both coaches admit their personal connection adds a unique quality to the matchup.
“I definitely have to admit, yes, it does, but it’s really more — and David would say the same thing — about the kids because they’ve earned this spot,” Nadeau said.
“But for me personally, as a small side story, I love the fact that we’re going to get a chance to get on the field with Bangor and compete because if we happen to play well and if we’re lucky enough to win, I think everybody on our side can walk away and feel like we won a title and we did it by having to go through the very best.”
Indeed, Bangor is the current standard by which other programs around the state are measured.
The Rams have won 19 consecutive postseason games — a run that began in 2014 — to capture the last four Class A state championships and now five straight regional titles after senior catcher Tyler Parke’s walk-off grand slam in the bottom of the seventh inning lifted Bangor to a 5-1 victory over Oxford Hills of South Paris in Tuesday’s A North final.
Gorham will try to win its first state championship since moving up to Class A, its previous state titles coming as a Class B program in 1998 and 2005.
“What Bangor’s done is incredible,” Nadeau said. “Every one of us who does this with kids understands how hard it is to get there and for them to get there as many times as they have is almost unthinkable.
“There’s always been that thought in the back of my head as a coach, and I’ve been coaching high school baseball down here for 16 years (first at Windham and since 2009 at Gorham), that it would be great to end up in that final game with Bangor and so this is it, we get our chance.”
A mutual influence
That Nadeau and Morris have arrived at this unique reunion perhaps should not be surprising given the similarities in their baseball backgrounds.
Morris and Nadeau played together on Bangor’s High School 1985 baseball team, Morris the the senior catcher and Nadeau a sophomore shortstop and No. 3 pitcher.
“That was really my first experience with varsity baseball, and we had a team of players led by David’s senior class that was more of a football class with David and Mark Lewis and Keith Norton that grew up with (former Bangor football coach) Gabby Price,” Nadeau said.
“I didn’t know how talented we were. I remember that team so vividly because of how special a group it was, but I looked around during preseason and thought, ‘I don’t know if we’re going to win a game.’ From a talent perspective I certainly didn’t think we would be undefeated state champions. I remember going home and telling my parents I didn’t know if we were going to be very good.’”
It turned out coach Bob Kelley’s team not only was very good that year, the 1985 Rams finished the season 20-0 after edging Portland 4-3 in the Class A state final played at the University of Maine at Orono.
“When the lights went on and that season started, to see those older guys compete like they did led by David, it was something to see and it was how the younger kids learned to play, it was how I learned,” Nadeau said. “I think it starts at that leadership level. They set an expectation to do things right and win, and we were no different than what you see out of the group they have now.”
That leadership for Bangor High School baseball during the mid-1980s was epitomized by Kelley, who guided the Rams to eight state titles and 15 regional championships during his 32 years as head coach.
And it will come as no surprise if both Morris and Nadeau employ strategies and philosophies they learned from Kelley and his staff when they meet on the baseball field again Saturday.
Morris sees in Gorham a part of the game he has used successfully with both the Bangor high school and American Legion programs.
“In its last game (Gorham) wasn’t afraid to bunt with their No. 1 hitter and they also bunted with the seven hitter,” said Morris, who works as an alternative education teacher at Brewer High School and also is set to become Bangor High School’s varsity football coach this fall.
“Sometimes you might get some coaches who only bunt with the bottom of the order and let the top of the order hit, but that’s definitely a coach Kelley philosophy. I know that whenever there’s an opportunity to bunt that we’re going to bunt with anybody, and they definitely play some small ball.
“I think it’s going to be a great challenge for us,” he added.
For Nadeau, who went on to pitch at the University of Maine under the late Dr. John Winkin after graduating from Bangor High School in 1987, much of Kelley’s influence on his coaching style involves just that, coaching style.
“What coach Kelley was so great at was putting kids in a position to be successful,” said Nadeau, who today is president and chief executive officer of Maine Capital Group, a Portland-based commercial and residential lending company. “He didn’t coach to the top-level kid, he didn’t coach to the bottom-level kid. He was very good strategically at creating a lineup that was difficult to beat.
“I always tell my kids now that that we don’t want to worry too much about who we’re playing, we just want to do our thing and be very difficult to beat. I thought coach Kelley was always great at that. No matter what he had to work with, he figured out a way to put his kids in the best position to win.”
The matchup
Gorham will field a veteran team for the state final led by eight seniors who are largely third-year varsity players under Nadeau.
“They’re obviously a team that has been fighting over the last five or six years to get where they are today, said Morris. “They’ve won some big games, they have a solid lineup and it sounds like they have some resurgent pitching with (ace Ryan) Norris coming on.
“They’ve got a good group of seniors so they’ve been through the ringer and they know how to win.”
Bangor is similarly experienced in terms of age, but one factor that concerns Nadeau is the quality of that experience in big-game situations.
“The biggest thing that concerns me is how those kids have an ability to win,” he said. “Those kids expect to win. They’ve done it time and time again and they’ve grown up watching the kids before them win.
“I almost don’t even care what their talent level looks like, I just know they’re tough kids and they know how to win, so we’ve got to match that. We’ve just got to try to be who we are and do what we do and hope we play well enough to be in a position to win.”
