Chaffin sparks Brunswick ‘D’

BANGOR – Arron Chaffin was emotional, tears in his eyes and a plaque in his hands as his teammates on the Brunswick football team kissed the Pine Tree Conference championship award.

A few minutes later, the starting nose guard was much more analytical in discussing how the Dragons stopped Bangor for a 14-12 victory and a berth in next week’s Class A state championship game.

Chaffin – a 6-foot-4, 315-pound junior better known as Moose to his teammates – had a theory. If you buy the idea, then you have to credit Brunswick’s defense at least in part for the win at a blustery Cameron Stadium.

In one of the key plays of the game, Bangor standout Mike Prentiss fumbled the ball while running to the right for a two-point conversion with 5:47 left in the game. He had an open lane to the end zone, but simply dropped the ball.

The play came seconds after he had scored to cut Brunswick’s lead to two points, but the touchdown didn’t come easily. In fact, it took the Rams eight plays from within the 12-yard line to get the ball into the end zone. Most of the time it was Prentiss trying to bull through Brunswick’s defensive line.

“I think that wore him down,” Chaffin said. “Even though he got in, it took him [eight] plays. It wasted the time and helped us a lot.”

The Dragons went at Prentiss all game. No wonder, as the senior running back led the PTC in rushing (1,903 yards going into Friday’s game) and scoring (27 touchdowns).

He rushed for 274 yards in last week’s PTC semifinal against Mt. Blue of Farmington. Prentiss amassed 78 yards in the first half Friday.

“He was our main concern,” Chaffin said. “We knew he was the main person we had to stop and we did that. At the beginning of the game we didn’t do it, but at halftime we adjusted.”

The Dragons knew they would need a huge defensive effort. Bangor went into Friday’s PTC final averaging 31 points per game and having gained 3,174 rushing yards.

“We just had to keep hitting him, because we knew it was cold and he would get tired,” said quarterback-cornerback Ralph Mims, a basketball star who had a scary moment in the first half when his knee hit asphalt on a tackle that sent him out of bounds.

The Rams finished with 122 rushing yards. Prentiss went over the 2,000 mark for the season with 120 yards on 30 carries. But he didn’t have any real game-breaking runs.

“They just had everyone in the box,” Bangor coach Mark Hackett said. “They just shut him down and he didn’t break any big ones. I thought they were good up front defensively. They got us in the backfield several times.”

Chaffin’s linemates included Phillip Warren, Garrett Maese, John Hamilton, Nate Brunette and Brandon Crouse. Andy Williamson made a few appearances to give the line a different look.

“He’s a bigger kid and we wanted to try to take away their iso (isolation) play,” Brunswick coach Dick Leavitt said of the 6-3, 280-pound senior. “He helped clog the middle a little bit.”