LEWISTON — It may have taken longer than it would have liked, but Lewiston High School notched its first win of the new year Saturday.
After a hard-fought tie with St. Dominic Academy and a disappointing showing against defending Class B state champion Messalonskee to start the calendar year, the Blue Devil grabbed its first victory since Dec. 23 with a 7-1 win over Biddeford at the Colisee.
“We played well against St. Dom’s, we didn’t play so well against Messalonskee and we certainly played well tonight,” Lewiston coach Jamie Belleau said. “It tells us if we do the little things right on any given night we have the chance to win.”
Lewiston started and finished strong, scoring twice in the opening frame and adding five unanswered in the final stanza. In 11:14 of game time, the Blue Devils surpassed their scoring output from their loss to Messalonskee earlier in the week.
Kyle Morin had both of Lewiston’s first-period goals. His first came 4:19 into the contest on a blast from beyond the blue line. Morin said he was about to go off for a line change and wanted to shoot the puck into the zone. His shot went on net and between the pads of Biddeford goalie Tom Green.
Morin added his second late in the period when Joey Frechette fed him a pass in front from behind the net.
“Coming off to a game where we know we didn’t really show up to play, it was important to get out there and show them we weren’t here to mess around,” Morin said. “We were going to step on them from the beginning.”
The Tigers responded in the second period and halved Lewiston’s lead. Tyler Belleorose corralled a circle-to-circle pass from linemate Zach Thompson and backhanded a shot by Nick Hawk as Biddeford went into the second intermission trailing 2-1.
“They seemed to have way more energy than we did and we were fortunate that it was two-one going into the third,” Biddeford coach Rich Reissfelder said. We kind of felt like maybe we could take advantage of that and steal one, but it went the exact other way.”
The third period belonged exclusively to the Blue Devils. Brady Cusson and Alex Rivet scored 46 seconds apart to give Lewiston a 4-1 lead six minutes into the stanza. Morin had the primary assist on both goals, giving him a four-point night.
“It’s the excitement of playing well and everyone’s getting along and getting in there and getting a part of the scoring,” Morin said. “Their hard work in the corners from every player on that bench is exciting for everyone.”
The Tigers took three consecutive penalties following Rivet’s goal and the Blue Devils capitalized on their final opportunity with the man advantage. Jeromey Rancourt netted the power-play goal and Griffin Wade and Kyle Ullrich added goals in the final two minutes.
“We wanted to win this game and it was important, but it was more important we had a good effort,” Belleau said. ” The kids skated for probably two periods. They played two periods exceptionally well and I think the second period wasn’t that bad but not like the other two and kept a good team like Biddeford in the game. Fortunately we showed up in the third period and were able to get a couple goals and separate us a little bit.”
The difference tonight was we had puck support down low on the forecheck,” Belleau said. “We were winning one-on-one battles. We were moving our feet. Our neutral zone got better as the game went on. Our gap control as good. We did things we expect to do.”
The Blue Devils outshot the Tigers 15-2 in the third period and 41-12 for the game.
Hawk picked up his second win of the season in net by making 11 saves.
The Blue Devils have already played one defending champion this season. Next up for Lewiston is two-time defending Class A state champion Falmouth on Wednesday.
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