For the first time in years, several central Maine teams are playing in Bangor as part of the North regional high school basketball tournament.
That’s because of a statewide reclassification that shuffled some teams around classes and regions.
And a few of those teams haven’t wasted any time getting adjusted to the Bangor tournament — so much so that the entire field of Class B North finalists are from central Maine.
Both the No. 1 Gardiner girls and No. 3 Gardiner boys are vying for the North title, and they’ll be going head-to-head with teams that they know well. The Tigers will be joined by No. 3 Lawrence of Fairfield in the girls final and No. 1 Cony of Augusta in the boys final.
The girls play at 5 p.m. Friday at the Cross Insurance Center, and the boys play at 6:45 p.m. Friday.
Cony head coach Isaiah Brathwaite is looking forward to another chance to play rival Gardiner, after the teams split two games during the regular season.
“Love it. It’s a good rivalry,” Brathwaite said after his Rams escaped a close semifinal win over Ellsworth. “It’s good for central Maine basketball, putting central Maine on the map, knowing that we can play.”
It has certainly been a good regional tournament for central Maine already.
Lawrence’s Maddie Provost has played on the Cross Center floor for the first time, and repeatedly proven to the Bangor-area fans why she’s one of the best players in the state. She led the Bulldogs to wins over Mount Desert Island and Ellsworth.
And both Gardiner teams seem to be enjoying the Bangor atmosphere as well. As boys coach Aaron Toman pointed out after a quarterfinal win over Erskine Academy, that was the first tournament game his program had won since a 2012 contest in Bangor.
“I don’t know, maybe Bangor is good juju for us,” Toman said with a smile last Friday. “I’m a big fan of the Bangor environment and this atmosphere. It’s just cool for our boys, kind of going up to Bangor.”
It’s also been a very successful journey north so far for the Gardiner girls team. Though a young squad, the top-seeded Tigers have looked very comfortable in Bangor so far with comfortable wins over Cony and Presque Isle.
“They’re just buying into our culture,” Gardiner girls coach Britney Gero said after Wednesday night’s win over Presque Isle. “I started this season with only our returning varsity kids. And we’re really young, and they’ve just bought into everything that I’ve brought to them. They’re a true team. They play with just pure grit and teamwork. I’m so proud of them.”
Gero was happy to see the Class B North finals full of fellow Kennebec Valley Athletic Conference teams from central Maine. And she’s proud of the effort and energy that has powered her Tigers team to those finals.
“It’s amazing. It’s amazing for the KVAC,” she said. “It just shows what the KVAC is all about.”