LIVERMORE FALLS —The consolidation of the Jay and Livermore Falls school systems had been anticipated for so long, it almost seemed the former rivals were always meant to be together.

Yet it still hasn’t completely sunk in for Mark Bonnevie, the nine-year head coach at Jay and the first head coach of the Spruce Mountain Phoenix. Sometimes, Bonnevie and defensive coordinator Brian Dube, a long-time assistant at Livermore Falls, look over row upon row of green-and-black clad players during warm-ups and can’t believe their eyes.

“We just sit there and shake our heads and go, ‘Wow,'”Bonnevie said.

It’s the sheer numbers that strike Bonnevie and his staff. Preseason practices were bustling with over 60 players. In recent years, Jay and Livermore Falls’ rosters often didn’t reach half that size. 

The players noticed the change at their first practice.

“We’ve never had a team team this big, so just doing simple things like getting through drills is a lot different,” said senior guard and defensive end Tommy Lee. “But it’s fun. It’s been really exciting.”

“Every time I step on the field, I get all these butterflies because it’s a whole new challenge this year,” senior running back and linebacker Bill Calden said.

The butterflies will likely be swarming the Spruce Mountain sidelines Friday night when the Phoenix kick off their first regular season game at Greely. After more than half a century of playing in Class C (and being two of the smallest Class C schools at that), Jay and Livermore Falls will be clashing with Class B perennials such as Mountain Valley, Wells, York, Lake Region and Fryeburg Academy in 2011. And there are many who expect them to immediately play like they belong.

Remnants of a rivalry

The rivalry between Jay and Livermore Falls outlasted the local paper mill that tied the two communities together for a century.

Declining enrollments in both school systems, however, made consolidation appear more and more unavoidable in recent years. Yet as late as last winter, many involved with athletics at the two high schools thought the programs wouldn’t merge until the start of the 2012-13 school year.

Even though a reorganization subcommittee recommended the high schools merge in July of 2012, the school boards from each town voted separately last March to combine sports teams starting July 1, 2011.

The quick merger allowed the football players to participate in 7-on-7 sessions held at Leavitt High School and gave them a head start on renewing acquaintances. Most of them played together through eighth grade in Area Youth Football.

“It seems like we’ve been together for more than just a few weeks,” two-way tackle Jake Richards said.

“They’ve gotten over the rivalry part of it and it’s been better than we ever expected as a coaching staff,” Bonnevie said.

Whether the two towns get over the rivalry as easily is still a question. Bonnevie said he has sought advice from Mountain Valley coach Jim Aylward, who was the head coach when Rumford and Mexico merged into a Class B powerhouse in 1989. Aylward told him it was a couple of years before fans stopped counting the number of Rumford and Mexico kids on the field for each play.

Bonnevie hopes he can pre-empt such accounting practices at Spruce Mountain.

“As a coaching staff, when we look at each kid, we don’t see what town they’re from. We see a Spruce Mountain football player,” he said.

Still, noticeable factions from Jay and Livermore Falls exist throughout the team.

Bonnevie’s assistant coaches, Dube, Garrett Young and David Frey, all coached for Livermore Falls. The offensive line is dominated by former Andies such as Lee and Richards. The most prominent skill position players are former Tigers, including Calden and Bonnevie’s son, Zach, the starting quarterback.

Adding to the challenge of bringing the team together is the fact that the players continue to attend school in separate buildings. Players from Jay still go to the former Jay High School, now known as the Spruce Mountain North Campus, and are bused to practice every day at the Spruce Mountain South Campus, the former Livermore Falls High School.

“Going to separate schools is going to be different,” Zach Bonnevie said. “We’re only going to see each other at practice. But I think we’re still going to be fine. We’ll be together. We’ve been together.”

Coach Bonnevie said he won’t know if his team is truly together until it faces some adversity.

“One of the big keys is when we have a bad quarter or a big turnover, will they still stay together?” he said.

Flick the switch

While being together as a team is the product of good chemistry and leadership and only a bus is needed to get everyone to Griffin Field, playing together on the field requires a great deal of time and repetition.

The Andies and Tigers not only learned different techniques in the fundamentals of the game such as blocking and tackling at their respective schools. They ran almost completely contrasting offenses — the old-fashioned Wing-T at Livermore Falls and the ultra-modern spread offense at Jay.

“For three years, we’ve been learning something different, and now we’ve got to flick the switch and be able to learn, and learn quick,” Lee said.

At early practices and scrimmages, a number of players were wearing wrist bands with the plays taped to them. Players from Jay are also helping get their new teammates up to speed.

“It’s a lot different, but you put in the work,”  Richards said while glancing down at his cheat sheet.

“It’s a new learning process for everyone,”Calden said, “so I think if we help each other out, which we have so far, things are going to work out good.”

Bonnevie said the ex-Andies are adjusting well to his playbook, adding that the preseason is as much of a learning process for him. Once he and his staff get to know how his players fit together, he plans to take advantage of Spruce Mountain’s depth by having many players play one way and using multiple personnel packages on offense, defense and special teams.

If nothing else, Bonnevie will be able to sleep easier at night knowing a couple of injuries won’t have a catastrophic impact on his roster.

“If this guy goes down, we’ve got another weapon coming in,” Zach Bonnevie said. “(If someone got injured last year), we’d be in bad shape.”

The depth and overall collection of talent has locals dreaming of a playoff berth and even a state championship, which would be the first for either town since Jay shared the Class C championship with Marshwood and Orono in 1979. Jay went 5-4 last year and reached the Western C quarterfinals. Livermore Falls went 4-4 and did not make the playoffs.

The buzz for the upcoming season has grown quickly in the two towns. As many as two dozen spectators showed up for at least one of Spruce Mountain’s early practices. Players, coaches and administrators are anticipating huge crowds for the Sep. 9 home opener against Falmouth, the Sep. 16 tilt with Mountain Valley and Oct. 7 homecoming against Lake Region.

Bonnevie knows there will be pressure to win right away, but said he won’t allow it to permeate the Phoenix locker room.

“I don’t think there’s any way we can keep the people from the outside from having those expectations,” he said. “But on the football team, all we’ve talked about is there’s no pressure on the kids. We just want to try to get better every week and get into the playoffs and see where we’re at, just like always.”

“I think the biggest expectation is just to play together,” Calden said, “and play good football.”

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