The man who made the Calais girls basketball team into one of the most successful high school programs in the state may not return for a 17th season next year.

Bob McShane, who coached the Blue Devils to more than 200 wins in the past 10 seasons, as well as nine Eastern Maine Class C and championships and five state titles since 1993, said he wants to make a career change, and that might not leave room for basketball.

“I’ll take some time to think about it but I wouldn’t count on it,” McShane said after Calais fell to Dirigo of Dixfield 46-38 Saturday in the Class C state game at the Augusta Civic Center.

“It’s been 16 years and you’ve got another good group of freshmen,” he added. “If I stay I have to stay until they’re gone, and by then there’s another good group.”

McShane, 47, took over the Calais team in 1987 and coached them to a 4-14 record. The next year the Devils were 14-4 and haven’t lost more than four games in a regular season since.

McShane has worked at the Washington County Technical College in Calais and served as the high school’s interim athletic director in the 1999-2000 school year.

“I’ve had jobs that have allowed me the time to coach,” he said. “If I make a career change I may not have the time.”

Woodland impresses Hartwell

Valley of Bingham girls coach Gordon Hartwell was mighty impressed with Eastern Maine’s entry in Saturday’s Class D state girls game in Augusta.

“Honestly, watching Woodland play, I don’t know if you took the top three teams in Western Class D and combined them and took the best 10 players, I don’t know if you’d beat them,” said Hartwell, who coached the Cavaliers to an 18-3 record this season.

“That girls team runs the break as well, other than Calais, as any girls team I’ve seen. Every one of them looks up, they fill the lanes.”

But for all his interest in watching Woodland play, it wasn’t enough to take his mind off what was to come. Hartwell’s twin sons Jason and Luke still had to play for the Valley boys in their game against Bangor Christian, which followed the girls game.

“I’ve seen them play every game, elementary, junior high, through high school, and I have never been as nervous as I was today for this game,” Gordon Hartwell said after Valley won its fifth straight title. “I felt like I was playing. I’m just so glad they got the final chapter written.”

Cony shows defensive wrinkle

Fans of Eastern Maine Class A girls basketball may have scratched their heads in disbelief Saturday morning while watching the quarterfinal matchup between No. 1 seed Cony and No. 4 Bangor.

Coach Paul Vachon’s teams, which have built a reputation on tenacious man-to-man defense, played a fair amount of 2-3 zone during the win over Bangor.

“I’m scared of it,” Vachon said. “I love the 3-point shot and I hate giving it up [by playing zone]. When it goes in, I say, ‘that zone stinks.’ ”

Cony, which utilizes only seven or eight players in key games, has benefited from playing the 2-3. For starters, 6-foot-2 center Katie Rollins and 6-0 forward Jauna Andrews are an imposing duo clogging up the middle.

But there are other benefits.

“We rebound well out of the zone, we stay out of foul trouble out of the zone and it rests our kids,” Vachon said. “Maybe I have to play a little bit more than people are accustomed to seeing Cony play, but we just put it in the last couple weeks.