BANGOR – You can be sure Joan Sawyer found a few minutes to get away from working the media check-in table at the Bangor Auditorium to watch some of Saturday night’s Eastern Maine Class C girls basketball final between Dexter and Central of Corinth.

The matchup, featuring two women coaching against each other for the first time in many seasons, piqued Sawyer’s interest because she went through the same thing more than 20 years ago.

Sawyer, the former Bangor High School girls basketball coach, went up against Presque Isle boss Dianne Folsom in the 1981 Eastern Maine Class A final. Folsom’s Wildcats came away with a 75-57 win before falling to Westbrook in the state championship game.

Dexter’s Margaret Veazie and Central’s Diane Rollins may be the first women coaches to face each other in a regional final since that 1981 season, when female coaches were much more prevalent.

“I hope it’s a great game, well-played,” Sawyer said Saturday afternoon. “I’m going to try to go in [to the sound booth] to watch some of it. I really do love the game and I miss it. It meant a lot to me. I had a lot of great memories.”

Sawyer recalled her game against Folsom as a quarterfinal or semifinal, but coaching against a woman wasn’t a big deal in the early years of the girls tournament.

“It wasn’t unusual because there were more women,” she said. “It wasn’t as much of an issue.”

But once the salary scales for boys and girls basketball coaching positions were put on equal footing, she said, more men started to look for jobs coaching girls teams. Sawyer recalled making $750 in 1971, her first season coaching the Rams. A few years later, after the pay scale was opened up, salaries jumped to around $1,600.

“When they opened up the salary scale that had a lot to do with drawing men into the programs,” she said.

Sawyer and the Bangor girls got over the 1981 loss and went on to win the state title in 1982. She has been working at the tournament for three years, after retiring from teaching. But she watched tourney games as a fan.

Dexter’s Veazie said she felt the significance of Saturday’s game.

“I’m very proud to stand there with Diane and her team,” Veazie said. “It’s great. Driving down today I thought, it’s great to see two women coaching.”

The defending champion Tigers went on to win the game, which puts Veazie in an elite field of women who have coached a team to two EM basketball titles. Sawyer (1977 and 1982) and Van Buren’s Jackie Derosier (1975 and 1977) also won two Eastern Maine titles.

Battle of the birds

Perhaps the most entertaining halftime show of tourney week was a pickup basketball game between the Erskine Academy Eagle and the Hermon Hawk.

Mascot mania overtook the Bangor Auditorium floor at intermission of the Eastern B boys final, as Jason Tarr of Hermon and Jeremy Brown of Erskine Academy of South China went bird on bird.

Hermon Hawk jumped out to an early 2-0 lead, but a talon-check foul (as opposed to a hand check) against the Hawk resulted in the Erskine Eagle falling to the ground and momentarily losing his head.

To his credit, the Hawk called the foul on himself, and the Eagle scored on the next possession as the game ended in a 2-2 tie – much to the favor of the appreciative crowd that delayed going out for halftime refreshments until the birds had flown the coop.

Leibowitz shines for Eagles

When junior forward Josh Jones went to the Erskine Academy bench after drawing his fourth foul with 1:26 left in the third quarter, the Eagles suddenly were without their primary inside scoring threat.

Except no one told James Leibowitz.

Leibowitz, a 6-4 junior, came off the bench to score eight crucial points in the second half, six in the fourth quarter as Erskine pulled away for a 61-45 victory over Hermon in the Eastern Maine Class B championship game.

“I consider myself very lucky because Josh Jones was on the bench for most of the fourth quarter, and to have someone come off the bench to fill his role, that’s big for us,” said Erskine coach Tim Bonsant.

“Leibowitz came in and had four big hoops for us. He didn’t play much during the regular season, but he’s 6-4, long and lanky, and I thought he’d a be a matchup problem for them.

Leibowitz benefited from the perimeter shooting of teammates Steve Childs and Darrell Haskell, who combined for three 3-pointers early in the fourth quarter.

That opened up the inside for Leibowitz, who capitalized in this prime-time opportunity despite seeing just periodic action during the regular season.

“He’s not the strongest kid on the team, but when he shows up and he’s ready to play, he’s tough,” said Bonsant “He reminds me of a small Kevin McHale. He’s got great mechanics, great footwork, he just can’t get off the ground.

“But he puts it in the hole.

Shead’s Davis done, again

Shead of Eastport coach Bob Davis will end his second stint as the school’s girls basketball coach on what he considers a high note.

The Tigerettes struggled in Saturday’s Eastern Maine Class D final game, losing 65-35 to Lee Academy, but Davis was pleased with the season as a whole.

“I think we overachieved this year, I really do,” he said as the girls were gathering for a group photo with the runner-up plaque. “I mean, 13-5 in the regular season, I thought that was great, and to make it into finals is a heck of a job.”

Davis’ daughter Samantha is graduating, so is makes sense for him to leave.

“And 19 years is enough so I’m going to give it up,” he said. “It takes so much and I think I’m a little bit tired.”

Davis first coached Shead from 1981-92, leading the Tigerettes to a 189-125 record and 10 tourney appearances. When replacement Dean Preston left after the 2001-02 season Davis took over again and went 26-10 in the past two seasons.

Davis is also the school’s athletic director and a longtime referee who has officiated tournament games in the past.

Davis said Samantha, a guard, would like to play basketball in college and will likely stay in Maine to attend a school like Maine Maritime Academy in Castine, Thomas in Waterville or Southern Maine in Gorham.

“She’s really undecided,” he said. “I think now that it’s all over she’ll take a look at it.”

Playing with Ames sisters

Fans and mascots came up with some cute ways last week to play with both Dexter sisters Ashley and Mallory Ames’ last name and height.

The Dexter Tiger mascot had a fake hand attached to a long stick so that he could high-five the girls – junior Ashley Ames is listed at 6-4, freshman Mallory Ames is 6-6 – when they jogged through a lineup of teammates and cheerleaders during the pregame introductions.

And Dexter fans hung up a sign that read “Ames is back in business” along the balcony on the home team side. It’s a reference to Ames Department Stores Inc., which at one time had 20 stores in Maine but went bankrupt in 2002.

An opposing fan tried to play on the sisters’ last name, too. A Houlton fan at the Friday night Eastern Maine Class C semifinal wore a shirt that read “Put Ames out of business.”

Ashley Ames scored 23 points in the final and 19 in the semifinal.