“None of her shots were hard shots,” Ward-McLean said. “She just stayed low and was in a good position.”

Three of Belaire’s tips and touches beat Maranacook keeper Autumn Munn in the second half and Sadie Royer added another goal in the first half as the host Leavitt Hornets topped the Black Bears 4-0 Thursday in a persistent biting mist.

“This gives us some confidence,” Ward-McLean said. “We didn’t have a lot of returning players. We’ve had a couple games in a row now where we’ve scored a few goals, and it has the girls thinking, ‘We can score, we can hold the other team.’ It’s important for us now.”

The Hornets lifted their record to 2-1, and have scored 13 goals in two games since a season-opening 4-1 loss against Mt. View.

“It was good to poke a few more in there,” Ward-McLean said. “On a day like today, one slip and it’s a tie game. It was nice to get that second and third goal at least.”

Belaire’s effort wasn’t necessarily out of character, but more of a surprise.

“I’m not usually the person who gets the goals,” Belaire said. “Last year I was only on JV, so I didn’t really do too much. But this year I guess I’m coming out of my shell and getting a little better.”

For the Black Bears (1-2), this season represents a positive step forward, regardless of the team’s record: This year, the team is playing with more than 10 players every game.

“In practices, we can do a lot more with game-like scenarios,” Maranacook coach Jeannine Paradis said. “We actually have kids to play against. We can do 5 v. 4, we can do 5 v. 5 … It’s all teaching now. Teaching skills, breaking old habits.”

Last season, Maranacook made the playoffs despite playing a player down for a handful of games. They also played their Western C playoff contest with only 10. This year, Maranacook is back to 15 players, including a pair of goalies.

Thursday, the Bears had a tough time getting out of their own way, a situation exacerbated by a quality Leavitt squad.

“This team has played so much better than we did today,” Paradis said. “We have been moving pretty well off the ball. We’re still young, there will be mistakes, and we know that. But we really have played better field hockey. Leavitt’s a great team, for sure, but I feel like we still could have done some more things on our end. That will come, it’s only Game 3.”

The Leavitt defense held Maranacook without a shot on goal in the game.

“Chantel (Eells) did a great job in the middle controlling things, talking to everyone,” Ward-McLean said. “Positioning was big. Alana Hartford came up big on the right side for us, Kaitlyn DeBlois on the left, containing things and making sure things didn’t get back there in an ugly way.”

Despite the defensive dominance, Royer’s goal stood as the lone marker in the opening half, and that came early, just 3:53 into the game.

Belaire got things going for the Hornets in the second, taking a feed from Kierstin Leclerc and putting her shot home with 16:43 to play in the game.

Kaitlyn Leclerc assisted Belaire’s second strike less than three minutes later, and her third, with 5:05 to play, came after a solid shot from Emma Martineau glanced off Munn’s pads in front. Belaire tapped the ball over the line.

“You just have to stay low, keep your stick down,” Belaire said. “That’s pretty much the key concept of tips and touches into the goal.”

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