In the week after the Vikings made history by bringing home both girls and boys Class B state championships, Caribou has still been humming with excitement.
Some residents are certain the girls’ victory against Biddeford will go down in history right alongside the iconic 1969 boys’ state championship game, when Viking Mike Thurston launched a Hail Mary shot at midcourt to snag the win for Caribou.
But more than that, people are filled with pride — not just for two teams of high schoolers who traveled 300 miles away and played their best, but for what the wins mean to the community.
At Ruska Coffee on Thursday morning, a few customers shared their excitement.
“It’s a basketball community and you can see that it paid off,” Chadwick Junkins said. “I’ve never seen the girls and boys win together.”
It was the first time in Caribou history that both basketball teams won state championships in the same year.
Junkins lives in Presque Isle, but has followed the tournament and is happy to see two gold basketballs come back to The County. He didn’t attend the games in Portland but said he wished he could have.
“The Deprey girl is a phenomenal athlete — all the Deprey kids are,” he said.
Star senior guard Madelynn Deprey had 31 points in the championship game to cap off a phenomenal tournament and season for the Caribou girls.
And as Junkins pointed out, Deprey’s brothers Sawyer and Parker were instrumental in the Viking boys’ state championship win in 2019 — the first state win for Caribou since 1969.
Joey and Lindsey Cowett saw this year’s championship games, Lindsey in person and Joey on television, and both said the energy was electric.
The girls game especially was riveting, Joey Cowett said.
“It worked on your emotions,” he said. “In one breath, I thought, ‘Oh, the game’s over.’ In the next, it was like, ‘Oh, my God, they did it.’ Just a whirlwind of emotions.”
Both Cowetts mentioned freshman guard Quinn Corrigan’s game-winning free throws at the end of overtime, and said Caribou couldn’t have had a better player on the line. At her age, with all the people in the stadium, to have had the focus she did was amazing, they said.
Deprey said after the win that she was “100 percent” sure that Corrigan would knock down those two free throws with the game on the line.
“Quinn thrives in that type of situation,” Deprey said.
Even though the boys led throughout their game, Joey Cowett said he was literally moved to tears at the end because the team worked so hard throughout the tournament.
“They just played as a team and you could see it,” he said. “After the buzzer went off, I just felt so proud.”
Over at the Caribou Wellness and Recreation Center, Recreation Director Matt Bouchard reflected on what it was like to be in the Portland arena. The boys had a great victory, but people were on the edges of their seats for the entire girls’ game, he said.
When Deprey went to the line, with Caribou trailing by 1 point and 1.5 seconds left on the clock, people in the stands thought the only way to win was for her to miss a shot and someone grab the rebound for a quick basket, he said.
But Deprey accidentally made that shot, and it seemed like opposing Biddeford would win the game. Then Corrigan saved the day with a steal, and she was fouled with .4 seconds left.
“It happened so quick. We heard a whistle and thought, ‘What just happened?’” Bouchard said. “Quinn was on fire for those free throws, and the place just erupted in cheers.”
Parents and kids have been coming in all week on cloud nine, he said.
Most of the players started out in rec basketball programs, so there’s a lot of pride. But more than that, the Vikings’ newest champions are inspiring the next generation of players.
“We’re going to have a lot of kids get into basketball now because of these players. They’ll want to be just like them,” he said.
BDN Sports Editor Matt Junker contributed to this report.