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Cross Country:Massabesic has been through the give-me-a-break ruling that affected the Class A regionals.

By GLENN JORDAN, Staff Writer November 7, 2009

It's been a remarkable season for the Massabesic High cross country program. The girls went 14-0 in the regular season and finished second to Cheverus in the Western Class A championship meet.

The boys went 13-0 and also finished second to Cheverus in the regional meet, moving up from third when Nate Hathaway of Scarborough, the first runner across the line, was disqualified for wearing a thin rope bracelet on his right wrist in violation of a rule prohibiting jewelry.

A berth in the New England meet is within reach; Maine sends its three fastest teams that don't win state titles, along with the three that do.

Which is why, on a recent night, Massabesic Coach Mark Crepeau drifted into the dining room to gaze at the matching pair of runner-up plaques propped on his table.

"Yeah, I'm just staring at them," he told his wife when she asked from the other room. "That really was an amazing thing."

The boys never had finished so high at the regionals. It was the third straight year for the Massabesic girls. And yet nowhere was there more empathy for Hathaway and Scarborough than at Massabesic.

In particular, with Nikki Smith of the Mustangs.

"He worked so hard," Smith said. "I just thought (the DQ) was ridiculous, considering we're wearing safety pins on our uniforms. Just another rule that gets in the way."

The good news for Hathaway is that even without his score, the Red Storm finished third and qualified for today's state championship meet, also at Twin Brook Recreation Area in Cumberland. He gets to run again.

Smith wasn't so fortunate. Two years ago, as a freshman sloshing through a sloppy, rain-soaked course at Leavitt High in Turner, she happened upon a senior teammate, Kendra Johnson, in the final yards of the 3.1-mile race.

"I hadn't seen her the whole race until the end," Smith said. "We said, 'Hey, good job,' and we high-fived."

Had they done so anywhere else on the course, the incident likely would have gone unnoticed, forgotten. But the finish line is under a microscope. That's where judges gather, mainly to watch for obstruction and to ensure the correct order of finish.

They disqualified Smith and Johnson for violating a national rule that prohibits competitors from joining or grasping hands during a race.

With Smith and Johnson – Massabesic's fifth and sixth runners – the Mustangs beat Brunswick for the Class A title, 106-107, for what would have been the first cross country state championship in school history. Without them, Massabesic dropped to fourth.

"The worst thing I've ever had to do as a coach in my life," said Crepeau, whose official protest was denied, "is get on that bus ride home. We could have flooded that bus with tears. Those girls did not stop crying from when we left until we got home."

Such is the human aftermath of decisions that follow strict interpretation of rules without regard to their bearing on actual competition. Smith wants people to understand that before it happens again.

And it will.

Less than two weeks ago, a county champion in Maryland dropped from first to fourth because a team member was disqualified for breaking a rule involving the color of stitching on the seams of his undergarments.

"After going through the whole race and working as hard as we did, and then being disqualified for supporting another teammate," Smith said, "it's almost taking what I just did and throwing it in the trash like it didn't matter."

There was no next week for Smith, whose team lost not only its team title but also its opportunity to run at the New Englands. The next fall, Smith switched to soccer. But after two weeks of practice, she returned to running and Crepeau welcomed her back.

"I think she realized," he said, "this is where her home was."

An IT band injury in her right knee kept Smith from running for three weeks last month. Aided by the...