Maine Black Bears (2001)

It's not always easy being a Maine fan. Small budget, middle of nowhere, so-so sports teams while your chief rival (New Hampshire) sits on the sunny Seacoast, makes the football playoffs every year and kicks arse in almost every other sport it plays in (I mean, hoops and soccer now? Really?). It makes you wonder if you should be playing the other UNH (University of New Haven) instead.

I oversimplify, of course. Maine in the past has churned out nationally-renowned, history-making teams in hockey, women's hoops and baseball. Maine football is always very competitive, and occasionally, very good. And in 2001, the Black Bears were flat-out outstanding. 

Ninth-year coach Jack Cosgrove had slowly dug Maine out from revolting (a long string of 3-8 years) to respectability to reaching the top. The '01 Bears went 8-2 in the regular season (cut short to 10 games because of 9-11) and 7-2 in Atlantic 10 play to share the league title with Villanova, William & Mary and Hofstra (Hofstra?), and qualify for the NCAA I-AA (now FCS) playoffs for just  the third time in their history. Maine even beat UNH that year (57-24)!

Maine opened the playoffs at McNeese State in Lake Charles, La., where the Bears pulled off the 14-10 upset for the first postseason win in program history. A pair of third-quarter touchdowns -- a 27-yard strike from Jake Eaton to Chad Hayes and a 4-yard run by the late Royston English -- made the difference. 

The Bangor Daily News pages tell the story:
Maine wins its first playoff game in team history.
Note the honor stickers on the helmets, something
the Black Bears haven't done in years.

A week later, it was on to Northern Iowa, the school Kurt Warner made famous, and the UNI Dome. Although the teams were tied at 28 in third quarter, UNI scored four straight TDs to take a 56-28 win. Eaton, a member of the school's Hall of Fame, threw for 330 yards and three TDs in a losing cause. English, the workhorse running back who ran for 1,301 yards in the regular season and scored nine touchdowns, was out with an injured right foot.

All told, however, it was an amazing season, as Maine tied a school record for wins (9, broken just one year later), and finished 10th in The Sports Network I-AA poll, Three players -- tight end Hayes, linebacker and future San Diego Charger Stephen Cooper and safety Lennard Byrd -- were named All-Americans by various groups. Cooper was the A-10's defensive player of the year and Cosgrove was coach of the year. The achievements go on.

It may not be easy, but 2001 proved that Maine football can turn some heads, win a playoff game ... and yes, even defeat UNH. 

UMaine Hall of Fame quarterback Jake Eaton
and the 2001 home uniform, with drop-shadow numbers. 

Another shot of the home uniform, with receiver Stefan Gomes.
Note the  HY-OOGE Atlantic 10 patch; the football version of the league was a successor to
the old Yankee Conference and a predecessor to the current CAA.

Oh, you wanted to read about the uniforms? Yeah, I guess that's this blog is about. Maine was in its second year of a monochrome look with a script "Maine" on the helmet. What was new was the home jersey, with the oh-so-trendy drop-shadow numbers that aged about as well as Nickelback. The road shirts, in their final year, were first worn in 1997. The all-blue look at home has continued to this day -- a nice bit of consistency in a college football world where uniforms are dominated by anything but.

Can't bear to be without Black Bear uniforms? Here are some more: 2016, 2015, 2014, 2011-13, 1997-99, 1985, 1976-84, 1975, 1974, 1965, more 1965, 1963-64, 1957-59, 1949-50, 1939-46, 1928-29. Rivalry week: Maine-New Hampshire. Inside the jersey: 2010-13.