LEWISTON — Edward Little had Lewiston on the ropes.

The Blue Devils had plenty of punches left in their arsenal.

Griffin Wade scored a pair of goals, nine different players registered at least a point and Nick Hawk stopped 11 of the 13 shots he faced — including his final seven — to help Lewiston overcome an early two-goal deficit to post a 6-2 win over Edward Little at the Androscoggin Bank Colisee on Wednesday.

“We knew EL was going to play as tough as they possibly could, they’re going to gear up, it’s a rivalry,” Lewiston coach Jamie Belleau said. “They’ve got some kids on that team that can play, they work really hard.”

The Blue Devils (3-1), coming off an emotional overtime loss to Scarborough, were slow to find their footing against their cross-river rivals.

“Even though we know what to expect, sometimes the execution doesn’t come through how you’d like it,” Belleau said. “That’s what happened tonight, and you have to give EL credit, they capitalized on their opportunities.”

A penalty that drew the ire of the Edward Little bench appeared to turn the tide.

Officials whistled an Edward Little skater for slashing after he poked at the puck in Hawk’s webbing. Upset with the call, EL coach Craig Latuscha tried to get the officials’ attention, and was whistled for a two-minute bench minor.

“They got a power play, a 5-on-3 and scored on it,” EL coach Craig Latuscha said. “Good call or bad call, it was a penalty. We’ll learn from that.”

Trailing by one at the time, Lewiston capitalized on the ensuing 5-on-3 to even the score, and the snowball kept rolling downhill from there.

“They’re a good team, and they should come out on top when they play hard like that,” Latuscha said. “My team fought and never gave up.”

The Eddies stunned the Blue Devils in the early going.

Liam Benson put the visitors in front after a spurt of pressure, beating Hawk on a rebound in front after teammate Chris Poisson put a shot on the keepers pads down low. Benson tucked the puck under Hawk for the tally.

Benson added another 1:32 later, this time on a power play with a snipe from the right circle that beat Hawk high on a rush through center. The two-goal deficit was the largest the Blue Devils had faced on the young season.

“The biggest positive that came from this game is that we had a rival that came into our building, that’s giving us everything that they’ve got, and we had to fight through a two-goal deficit and came out on top,” Belleau said.

Lewiston got one back at 12:14 of the opening frame when Kyle Lemelin ripped a wrister from the left circle past EL keeper Devin Dumont, also on a power play, to cut the deficit to one at 2-1, but the Blue Devils trailed to end a period for the first time this season.

The teams traded power play chances to open the second period. EL had the first chance, registered a single shot but otherwise did not test Hawk. On the other end, Dumont stopped three Lewiston chances with an extra skater.

Buoyed by a pair of Edward Little penalties — one to the bench for protesting the other — the Blue Devils started pouring on the offense through the middle of the second.

Kyle Morin pulled Lewiston even at 11:10 on a 5-on-3, tipping home a shot from the point by Joey Frechette. Fifty-six seconds later, Eddie Emerson roofed a wrister from the right point to put the Devils in front to stay at 3-2.

“The start wasn’t good, but the response was sufficient,” Belleau said. “We had to come back against a gritty team that’s working really hard, and fight back from a two-goal deficit.”

In the third, Wade scored a pair 6:30 apart to run the score to 5-2, and a long-distance shot from Joey Frechette squeezed through EL keeper Devin Dumont with 1:27 to play to cap the scoring.

Dumont otherwise played a solid game, stopping 32 of the 38 shots in his direction.

Lewiston squares off next against rival St. Dominic Academy on Friday at the Colisee. EL will see Mt. Ararat/Lisbon on Friday at the Norway Savings Bank Arena in Auburn.

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