BETHEL -- Maranacook senior Amy Gifford laid down the two fastest slalom runs of the day to earn a sweep of the Alpine events in the Class B state ski championships at Sunday River.

Maranacook, the girls defending Class B overall champions, entered the slalom event trailing Yarmouth by 25 points, 51-76.

But a good Alpine team effort narrowed the gap to just seven points heading into today's final event, a 5-kilometer Nordic classical race at Black Mountain in Rumford.

Yarmouth owns a 104-111 advantage, the same seven point lead the Clippers had a year ago when the Black Bears came roaring back to win the title with a major victory in the classical race on the final day.

"We had a good team day, now we are hoping the Nordic team can pull it off," said Gifford.

"Hopefully, we can win the overall team championship."

Gifford cruised through the first run, racking up a 39.16 run, the only sub-40 effort of the day.

She added a 40.37 on her second trip through the gates for a combined time of 1:19.53, two seconds ahead of Emma Lobozzo of Gray-New Gloucester.

Maine Central Institute freshman Rebekah Kallgren (1:21.66) was third followed by Mt. Abram's Emily Luce (1:22.33) in fourth.

"It was a pretty fast course," said Gifford.

"I didn't do anything special. The course was straight so I just let it run."

Enabling the Black Bears to cut into the Clippers lead were solid efforts by Monica Purington, who finished seventh and Emma Prysunka and Kayla Brown, who finished 13th and 14th, respectively.

On the boys side, MCI's Bart Kallgren produced another consistent day on the Alpine slopes to take the fifth spot with a two-run combined time of 1:15.88.

Joseph Atwood of Fryeburg won the slalom race in 1:10.90.

Casey Coyne gave Maranacook its only top 10 finish in the boys slalom race, finishing sixth in 1:15.92.

Falmouth won the boys title squeaking by Yarmouth, 90-91.

MCI was fourth and Maranacook fifth.

Waterville's Matthew Nale and Tory Quinn had two strong runs to finish 13th and 14th, respectively.

After three events, Prysunka is in first place in the four event Skimeister competition, leading Julianna Lord of Yarmouth, 24-45.

Lord is the defending Skimeister, edging Prysunka last season 66-76.

"My goal was to score under 40 points this year," said Prysunka. "Hopefully, I can do that and we can ski well as a team to win the overall."

The Black Bears Casey Spencer is within striking distance of first place in the boys Skimeister event trailing Falmouth's Ben Moody 20-35 while Lucas Mathers of Presque Isle has 32 points.

Spencer is the defending Class B Skimeister.

CLASS C

At Big Rock in Mars Hill, Winthrop senior Joel Walker turned in his second straight day of quality runs to finish in second place after earning his first career win in the giant slalom race on Monday.

In an extremely tight field of slalom racers, Walker just missed turning in the fastest first run time by .01 seconds, trailing Derek Smith of Central Aroostook, whose first run time was 37.87 seconds.

Walker maintained his position on the second run while Telstar's Frankie Delduca climbed into first place with a two-run time of 1:15.39, beating Walker's combined time of 1:15.71. Smith dropped to seventh. Rangeley's Daniel Duchesne was sixth.

"The course was really tight with not a lot of space between the gates," said Walker. "There were about 10 of us who had a chance to win the slalom race, it was really close."

Central Aroostook won the boys Alpine title with Rangeley finishing fifth in a field of 11 teams. Telstar ran away with the girls Alpine championship, scoring just 35 points to second place Fort Kent's 123.

Carrabec's Brandon Lane was 16th in the slalom race after placing fourth in the giant slalom event on Monday.

The Class C state meet will come to a conclusion today with a 5K Nordic classical race at the Nordic Heritage Center in Presque Isle.