The Scarborough boys and Cheverus girls took home Western Class A cross country titles Saturday at Twin Brook Recreation Area in Cumberland, but Massabesic collected two trophies, finishing second in both races.

In the boys’ race, the Mustangs were runner-up for the second straight year. But this time, they knew they earned it. In the 2009 regionals, Massabesic moved ahead of Scarborough after the Red Storm’s top runner, Nate Hathaway, was disqualified for wearing a bracelet.

“The boys were runner-up last year but it didn’t quite feel that way because of Scarborough and Hathaway being disqualified. They should have been second place,” said Massabesic Coach Mark Crepeau, who had offered last year’s trophy to Scarborough, but the Red Storm declined.

“We wanted to take home some hardware legitimately this year … we had a whole bunch of people who had a great race. Jakob Brooks was out of his socks.”

Brooks, a senior, finished second to Scarborough’s Nick Morris, recording a time of 17 minutes, 2.80 seconds over the 5K course.

The other Mustang scorers were senior Peter LePage (13th), sophomore George Morrison (22nd), senior Nathan Harris (25th) and junior Cory Mongiat (28th).

THE MASSABESIC GIRLS were still without injured Jocelyn Acheson, whom Crepeau is hoping will be back Saturday for the state meet.

Still, the Mustangs placed second easily, 21 points ahead of third-place Windham.

“We knew the girls were coming in pretty solid (this season),” Crepeau said. “Without Jocelyn running, it was a real crapshoot. We had some great races, especially from Mikayla Frazier and Charlotte Pierce.

“We’ll get Jocelyn back and we’ll see what happens next week.”

Pierce, a sophomore, placed seventh in 20:09.52 — more that two minutes faster than when she ran the course a month ago. Frazier, a junior, placed ninth in 20:35.23, a minute faster than last month.

Following them were senior Victoria Hurlburt (11th), senior Nikki Smith (25th) and sophomore Nicole Roberge (31st).

AT THE STATE MEET, Crepeau would love to collect two more second-place trophies.

“I don’t think anyone beats Scarborough,” he said. “A 38 (team score in the regionals) is amazing.

“The same thing with the Cheverus girls, with their 31 (in the regionals). They are going to be hard to beat.”

AS THE SAYING goes, a team’s running game is only as good as the people blocking up front.

Cheverus has a very good running game, as it showed Saturday against Deering. Opening the holes for running backs Spencer Cooke and Evan Jendrasko and protecting quarterback Peter Gwilym are tackles Zach Dulac and Sam Sanders, guards Mike Dedian and Tom Sullivan and center Cristian Doughty.

“They’ve matured as the season has gone along,” said Coach John Wolfgram.

The good news for the Stags and the bad news for the rest of Western Class A is that four of the linemen are juniors. Dulac is the only senior.

There was an adjustment period early on for the Cheverus line, but the unit is hitting its stride as the playoffs arrive. In Saturday’s 44-14 win over Deering, the offensive line moved Deering’s defensive front back time and time again. Cooke and Jendrasko often were four to five yards past the line of scrimmage before Deering could react.

“We had a nice rhythm to our offense,” said Wolfgram.

The Stags’ line helped to create that rhythm with their crisp blocking and determination to get the job done.

Cheverus’ team effort gave the Stags an 8-0 regular season and the top seed and home-field advantage for the playoffs. Cheverus will play No. 8 Windham at 12:30 p.m. Saturday.

LOGAN JORDAN, the Windham High team manager who was born with a serious heart defect, has practiced his place kicking this fall with the idea of getting a chance to kick once in the season’s last home game. That moment came late in the third quarter Friday night against Westbrook, with the Eagles leading 22-0. Jordan, a senior wearing No. 46, kicked off and then hustled off the field.

The Windham fans chanted “Logan, Logan” prior to and after his moment in the spotlight.

Jordan was the last player introduced on Senior Night and got to run through a tunnel of players that narrowed when his name was called.

TWO YEARS AGO, Thornton Academy ended Biddeford’s football season with a 23-6 win. The loss dropped the Tigers to 3-5 and out of the playoffs for the first time since 1982.

Last Friday, the Tigers beat the Trojans 27-22 to finish the regular season 7-1 — a huge step forward for the Biddeford program.

“It means a lot,” said Tigers Coach Scott Descoteaux. “This is my fourth year and this is the team that I felt we matched up best with them. But in moving the program forward and getting your younger kids to remember the memories of Biddeford football, you’ve got to win your rivalry game, you’ve got to win big games, big emotional games, you’ve got to come back and make certain plays at certain times to get the young kids to want to do this again.

“Tonight, we’re 7-1, we haven’t done that in a long time. There’s a buzz in town again about Biddeford football. And as we move the program forward, we hope that’s got a little bit of carryover to younger kids who want to play Biddeford Tiger football.”

THE GAME itself was pretty much everything you want in a rivalry game. Both teams had turnovers: Biddeford lost three fumbles in the first half; Thornton threw three interceptions. But that’s also part of an emotional rivalry.

“It was a typical Battle of the Bridge game,” said Trojans Coach Kevin Kezal. “I’m not going to question our kids’ effort, they played their hearts out. Down 21-8, they could have easily folded. But we just don’t play smart all the time.”

The Trojans had several costly penalties, including three 15-yarders.

“We definitely shot ourselves in the foot,” said Thornton’s Dimitri Skinsacos. “We made a lot of plays, but it definitely all comes back to the penalties.”

THE 50-50 drawing at the Biddeford-Thornton game was worth $1,593.

— Staff Writers Kevin Thomas, Tom Chard and Mike Lowe contributed to this report.