Wiscasset coach Daniel Wall gestures to players during a timeout in their game at Morse on Wednesday night. The Wolverines recently beat Islesboro, 24-21, breaking a 122-game losing streak dating back to December 2016. Derek Davis/Portland Press Herald

The Wiscasset High girls basketball team is why we love sports.

Yeah, we love following things like Cooper Flagg’s rise from Newport to the top of the college basketball world at Duke, and we enjoy being able to say we saw the Boston Red Sox when they were young ballplayers with the Portland Sea Dogs.

We love watching the very good high school teams do their thing, be it basketball teams that captivate the state’s attention every February or field hockey teams that win regional titles for decades at a time, or soccer teams that bring cities together.

The Wiscasset girls basketball team didn’t do anything like that. What the Wolverines did was a lot harder. Wiscasset persevered.

On Dec. 22, 2016, the Wolverines beat Hall-Dale. They didn’t win again until Jan. 10,  2025, when they beat Islesboro, 24-21. That run of losses lasted 122 games.

“It created kind of this losing mindset. Even the Islesboro game, it took a while to get out of that mindset and see the score and be like, we can win this,” said Xoe Morse, a sophomore forward. It was Morse who sank a pair of free throws in the final minute to give the Wolverines the lead for good in the game that finally ended the losing streak that began when she was in grade school.

The Classes of 2021, 2022, 2023, and 2024 came and went through Wiscasset High without winning a game. The Class of 2020 won that single game as freshmen three days before Christmas, 2016. For context, Wiscasset’s losing streak is 21 games longer than the longest wining streak in state history, the Valley boys basketball team’s run of 101 wins that ended in 2002.

To the Wolverines’ credit, they got up 122 times and came back to try again, even when the last victory was so long ago it felt like another school in another life. The win over Islesboro came under the most Maine circumstances possible, with a ferry ride across Penobscot Bay to and from the game.

“Follow us around. We’re going to win some more,” said Daniel Wall, the first-year coach of the Wolverines.

Wiscasset sophomore Jessie Rhinebolt gets encouragement from Paul Lambert before the start of the second half of their game Wednesday at Morse High in Bath. Morse won, 70-11. Derek Davis/Portland Press Herald

A basketball official for the last decade, Wall coached at Lincoln Academy 20 years ago. His friend, Jamey Roy, coach of Wiscasset’s boys team, convinced Wall to take the job.

“He came to me and was like, look, if anyone’s going to change the program, you can. I investigated and learned about the kids,” Wall said. “I knew these kids have a lot of heart. They have a lot of desire, and they have a lot to prove. They just want people to see them and see that they can play. I know what we can do. We’ll accomplish it.”

Wall instituted a summer basketball program and began teaching fundamentals. First, ball-handling drills. Then, learning how to play defense. Wall pushes his team hard. They knew the only way the losing would end was with a lot of effort. Losing is easy. You have to try to win.

“He encourages us to work our hardest in games, then pushes us harder in practice the next day so we continue to do our best,” said Brianna Farrin, a senior guard.

Farrin joined the team for the first time this season, as a way to do something with her sister Michelle, a sophomore.

“This is my first year playing basketball. I started in the summer. I’ve watched my sister play since her eighth-grade year. It was disappointing to see how much she loves basketball and losing all those games in a row,” Farrin said. “During that Islesboro game, I had it in my heart that we were going to win. I was so happy for her, specifically. This is her sport. It made me so happy to see how we’ve come together as a team to beat them.”

Wednesday’s game, a 70-11 loss at Morse, was Wiscasset’s first since the win. It was the team’s first game in nearly two weeks, after an illness that had run through the team gave Wall at most four of his eight players at practice, and it was against a team that plays two classes higher (Class B as opposed to Wiscasset’s Class D). Sprinkle in something the Wolverines haven’t felt in a long time — the pressure of expectations — and everything snowballed into a lopsided loss. It was a reminder that there’s still a lot of work to do.

“These kids have learned a lot. Sometimes I think I put a little too much pressure on them, because I know their ability,” Wall said. “They started at the bottom and they’re working their way to the top, and I’m proud of every one of them. There isn’t one kid who plays harder than another. Tonight was a tough loss, coming in against a Class B team, but they’ll bounce back. They’ll bounce back.”

They Wolverines have a little confidence now. They’re enjoying the game. They have tangible proof the work they’re putting in is yielding results. You get knocked down 122 times in a row, you have to get up that 123rd time, because to not would be the real failure.

“We’ve come so far, as individuals and as a team. We see it, and I think others are starting to see it too,” Morse said.

Wiscasset entered the weekend with eight more games to play in the regular season. That’s eight more chances to play. Eight more chances to show that when you’re down, you get up, as many times in a row as it takes.