Father-daughter team aids Shead CAHS, Lee show sportsmanship

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This is the second go-round for Shead High School of Eastport girls basketball coach Bob Davis when it comes to coaching his daughters.

Older daughter Laura played for him at Shead before graduating in 1999 and now Samantha is the driving force behind his current Shead team.

Samantha is a junior guard who had a game-high 25 points to go with six rebounds, five steals and four assists in their 53-38 Eastern Maine Class D quarterfinal win over Limestone on Monday.

“This one has a little more spitfire than my first one,” grinned Davis. “I could get on Laura a little bit and she’d just look at me and nod her head. This one will give me a little more than a nod.”

“I’ll talk back if I don’t like something,” acknowledged Samantha Davis with a smile.

“We both give it to each other a little bit,” said Bob. “She knows when to stop and I know when to stop.”

Samantha said she was a little skeptical about playing for her initially.

“At first, I thought we might have a few fights. But it has turned out really good,” said Samantha.

Are there any ground rules like no discussing basketball at the dinner table?

“No, that’s all we talk about,” said Samantha.

“We talk a lot of basketball at home,” agreed Bob.

So who does Bob’s wife, Peggy, side with if he and Samantha have a disagreement?

“A little of both. It depends. If I’m a little too hard on Samantha, she’ll side with Samantha a little bit. If she thinks I’m going too easy on her, she’ll say ‘Jeez, Samantha, why don’t you do this.’ We’ve got a lot of coaches in the family. There’s no question about that,” grinned Bob.

Samantha has a different view.

“Mom takes my side,” said Samantha.

Coincidentally, in Monday’s game, the Davis’ went up against another father-daughter combination in Limestone coach Bob Hancock and sophomore daughter Melanie.

Sportsmanship and support

You’d think that after a 20-point win in the Eastern Maine basketball tournament quarterfinals, players would be rushing off the court to celebrate with family and friends.

If you were the losing team, you’d likely want to retire to the locker room for some consolation.

Not the girls from Central Aroostook of Mars Hill and Lee Academy.

Rather than hit the showers and get some food after the game, the players from both teams lined up alongside the cheerleaders near the entrances to the locker room hallways to cheer on the boys teams which were scheduled to play next on Monday afternoon.

It was an understandable gesture for the Panthers’ girls team as their boys team was next out to play in the Eastern Maine Class D quarterfinals, but Lee’s action was a bit unusual, considering it was Van Buren’s boys they were cheering on.

“No, we hadn’t done it before. We just decided to do it,” said Lee junior guard-forward Kristin Hersom. “I guess it’ll be a new tournament tradition for us.”

It’s a longstanding tradition for the CAHS girls.

“We just like to help out with support and stuff like that, but we do it even if it’s not our guys playing,” said Panthers senior guard Ashley Caron.

“I’ve done it since I was a lot younger. We’ve all done it as long as I’ve been here,” CAHS junior forward Megan DeGraw.

Lee coach Carrie Goodhue didn’t know when the girls decided to do it, but wasn’t surprised by their gesture.

“Those girls are the type of girls that I don’t even have to tell to shake the other girls’ hands, or tell the refs they did a good job,” Goodhue said. “They just do that stuff on their own.”