Brewer football, hockey want to stay in `B’

Brewer High School has asked the Maine Principals’ Association Classification Committee for the right to remain in Class B ice hockey and football.

Principal Jerry Goss will ask the nine-man committee to consider factors other than the enrollment numbers when deciding the request.

“Transportation is an issue. We’d be playing more schools outside of our area,” Goss said. “I’m going to be asking them to look at our school population in more than just numbers. We’re in a day of multiple assessments and we have to ask, what is in the best case of football and hockey in general?”

The Witches’ head count as of Oct. 1, 1996, was 30 students over the 850 Class A-B cutoff mark for football and ice hockey.

The classification committee, which met Nov. 6, tentatively has decided not to change the enrollment cutoffs for the 17 MPA-sanctioned sports, which would govern the 1997-98 and 1998-99 sports seasons.

Without an exemption, Brewer would be forced to move to Class A to be eligible for postseason play. If the Witches received the committee’s permission to remain in Class B, Brewer would be eligible for the playoffs.

“We’re playing in a competitive spirit right now in the league we’re in,” Goss said. “I don’t think the move to Class A would be beneficial to our school.”

“The one [sport] that we looked at first was football,” he said. “I feel right now that we’re playing in an excellent league, we’re competitive. I just think a move right now to Class A would be a detriment to our teams.”

The classification committee meets Jan. 27, according to Mattanawcook Academy headmaster Richard Greenlaw, who said he had not yet seen Brewer’s request.

In addition to competitiveness, Brewer also would have to worry about an increased transportation budget for both sports.

In football’s Pine Tree Conference, the Witches would have to travel to Oxford Hills of South Paris and Mt. Blue of Farmington for games.

Brewer’s football team gained a playoff berth with a 6-3 regular-season record this season. The Witches finished their third postseason appearance since 1970 in a 14-7 LTC Class B loss to Orono.

An Eastern Maine Class A ice hockey schedule would include games against Thornton Academy of Biddeford and Edward Little of Auburn.

“The hockey situation, from what I’ve been told, would go up by a lot, and a lot of it is funded by the boosters club,” Brewer athletic director Dennis Kiah said.

Less than a month after receiving a scare in an exhibition game caused by a heart ailment diagnosed as WPW, Bangor High School standout sophomore center Jared Gordon will play his first game when the Rams host defending state Class A champion Waterville at the Sawyer Arena Wednesday night.

Gordon underwent a five-hour surgical procedure last Friday at Boston Children’s Hospital to rectify the problem. He came home on Saturday and he has practiced twice this week although it was without contact.

Bangor heart specialist and pediatrician Dr. Angela Gilladoga has given him permission to play on Wednesday.

“Jared had an EKG on Monday and it indicated that the procedure was successful,” said Leonard Gordon, Jared’s father.

“I wanted to play Saturday against Portland,” said Jared. “I feel perfectly fine. My legs are sore when I walk but they’re perfect when I’m on the ice.”

Lynn Gordon, Jared’s mother, explained that her son had five catheters inserted into the femoral artery through the groin area which has caused the soreness in his legs.

The procedure itself, performed by cardiac specialist Dr. Edward Walsh, involved burning away abnormal tissue that had the potential to alter the path and efficiency of the heart beat, according to Mrs. Gordon.

Two weeks following a fire in the boys locker room, Sumner High School of East Sullivan’s boys basketball team finally played host Tuesday night.

The Tigers, who were supposed to open the season Dec. 5 in the newly renovated gymnasium, played George Stevens Academy of Blue Hill.

The girls will play their first home game tonight against Jones-port-Beals.

Athletic director Denny Harmon said the boys and girls basketball teams began practicing in the gymnasium Friday, ending the teams’ wanderlust which put them on buses to the U.S. Naval Base in Winter Harbor and area elementary schools for practices.

Cleaners are still working on removing the soot from everything in the gymnasium, but the boys locker room, where the fire started, remains unusable.

“The cleaners are in here every day,” Harmon said. “It’s a slow process.[The gymnasium]’s got to be repainted because they can’t get all the soot off, but that’s the last thing to do.”