For the first time since Nov. 16, 2019, football will return to Maine Maritime Academy in Castine on Saturday when the Mariners entertain Hartwick College (N.Y.) at 1 p.m. at Ritchie Field.
The program was put on indefinite suspension by then-President William J. Brennan in August 2020 as a cost-saving measure during the COVID-19 pandemic.
MMA had an NCAA Division III football program for 74 years but Brennan said the football program’s $475,000 budget was the most expensive non-academic program at the institution.
The Mariners had also lost 22 consecutive games under former head coach Chris McKenney, who has since been replaced by Calvin Powell.
MMA got a new president in Jerry Paul and he contacted MMA Athletic Director Steve Peed the following April (2021) and had him come up with a plan to restore football.
He did and the school had to raise 75 percent of the start-up cost of $562,500 by Dec. 31, 2021.
MMA alums and local businesses stepped up and raised over $566,000 to restore the program and the Harold Alfond Foundation produced a matching grant of $250,000.
The Mariners scheduled sub-varsity games a year ago against Husson University of Bangor and the University of New England in Biddeford and they will play three regular season games this fall along with two more games against the Husson and University of New England sub-varsity teams.
In addition to the Hartwick game, MMA will travel to Nichols College (Mass.) at noon on Saturday, Sept. 14; host the UNE sub-varsity team at 2 p.m. on Sunday, Oct. 6; visit Newport News Apprentice School (Va.) at 1 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 12 and entertain the Husson sub-varsity team at 1 p.m. on Sunday, Oct., 20.
Beginning in the fall of 2025, MMA will join the Conference of New England, formerly known as the Commonwealth Coast Conference, and will play a full 10-game schedule.
Husson, UNE and Nichols are three of the current six teams in the Conference of New England. New England College (N.H.) will also join the league in 2025 along with MMA.
MMA has 38 players on its current roster.
“I’m excited,” said Peed. “I had never seen a happier group of football players in August. I joked with Coach Powell that he wasn’t working them hard enough.
“Their attitudes are fantastic,” added Peed.
Peed said he wished they had five or six more players but pointed out that it’s hard to recruit a player when they could only offer them a five-game schedule this fall including two games against sub-varsity teams.
“Coach Powell and his staff did a great job getting kids here,” said Peed.
“When you can go out and sell a full product (10 games), that’s a different proposition for next year’s class,” he said. “It takes a special kind of kid to come here knowing he’s not going to get that full 10-game schedule in his first year.”
Peed said they’ve got some players who want to be a part of building the program and they understand the long-term vision.
Powell said recruiting has gone well with 28 freshmen on the roster.
“This is going to be a true building block for the future. It’s a great opportunity to lay a foundation with this group of guys,” said Powell. “We have a very small older group of guys and they have really done a good job leading the way and explaining our expectations and what we’re trying to build.”
Powell said they aren’t trying to build for this weekend, they are trying to build for the future of the program and the institution. They are looking for players who fit the school’s academics-first mission.
The Mariners will have two quarterbacks who will see playing time on Saturday in Searsmont’s Dylan Abbott, who played for Belfast High, and Riley Paquin from New Mexico.
Abbott is a senior and Paquin is a freshman.
The running backs are all freshmen: Wil Keach from Leeds, Auston Harris from Florida and Jovell Smith from Louisiana.
The defense will be headlined by sophomore tackle Ashael Plum from Readfield and transfer graduate student linebacker Jack Mottola, the grandson of the late Bill Mottola, who was the head football coach and athletic director at MMA during a distinguished 37-career at the school.
Powell is looking forward to Saturday’s game, saying “I’m just thankful we have games so that we can go out and compete. This will give us a measuring stick. We’ll get a chance to see what we’ve learned in camp and what information is still not second nature to us.
“We’ll see where we are as a group and how we stick together for four quarters,” added the 38-year-old coach. ‘We didn’t have that opportunity with just two sub-varsity games last year.”
He said he would love to have 60 players on his roster next season but added that “50-plus is a good number for us.”
