AUBURN – The Edward Little Red Eddies played a smarter game Friday against the Brunswick Dragons than they had Thursday against Mt. Ararat, but the vaunted Brunswick power play, given just four full opportunities Friday, connected three times to thwart the Eddies’ upset bid.
Four different Dragons scored goals, and Chris Billett stopped 21 shots to help Brunswick edge Edward Little 4-2 in the final game of the Gipper’s Tournament at Ingersoll Arena.
The Eddies scored first in the game and set the Dragons back on their heels just 3:31 into the game when Kevin Smith slipped in from the high slot and gathered a pass from behind the net, snapping a shot past Billett for the 1-0 lead.
Two minutes later, on an extended power play thanks to back-to-back Edward Little minors, Cory Broniarczyk tipped in a shot from Tyler Cohen at the right point to knot the score. Brunswick went ahead on another power play chance at 8:05 of the first when Josh Clark fired a rebound past EL netminder Adam Loudermilk.
In the second, EL rebounded and carried much of the play at even strength. A late penalty, though, gave the Dragons power play unit, which is now 17-for-31 on the season another chance. At 11:30 of the middle frame, Henry Aschauer intercepted a clearing attempt at the right point, skated through the circle and popped the puck past Loudermilk to give Brunswick a 3-1 edge.
The Dragons went ahead 4-1 at 1:42 of the third when a puck dumped into the zone caromed off the back boards hit Loudermilk in the skates and the startled goaltender backed into his own net with the puck.
Greg St. Denis replaced Loudermilk after that play and finished the game, making three saves on three shots. EL climbed back to within two at 2:51 of the final frame on a Chris Carver goal, but would get no closer.
Coming around
Toby Poirier had a goal and two assists and Jon Roy had two goals to lead Lewiston to a 5-1 win over Mt. Ararat in the consolation game of the Gipper’s Tournament.
Alex Lafreniere picked up the win between the pipes for the Blue Devils, who rebounded well after a tough 4-3 loss to Brunswick on Thursday.
“It’s starting to come around,” said Lewiston coach Norm Gagne. “We had some good plays we didn’t quite finish tonight, but I thought our defense played well and we broke out well.”
Roy got things going at 5:04 of the first frame on a rebound in front of Mt. Ararat netminder Paul Baxter. Poirier notched his goal at 11:41 of the first on a slap shot from the point.
that hit an Eagles’ defenseman in the shin pad a bounced into the net.
Roy’s second of the game made it 3-0 at 12:09 of the second period.
Mt. Ararat scored one of its two shots in the third period to pull within two on a Kyle Murphy breakaway, only to have Lewiston’s Jordan Bourgoin and Christian Ouellette finish things off as the period closed. Ouellette’s goal was his first in his first varsity game.
Baxter made 26 saves on 31 shots for the Eagles, while Lafreniere saw just seven shots on the game and stopped six.
Send questions/comments to the editors.
