LEWISTON — The Edward Little boys hockey team dispatched rival Lewiston 5-0 with a team effort Monday at The Colisee.
Tate Morse had a goal and an assist and four other players scored for the unbeaten Red Eddies (8-0).
Freshman Andrew Clement said that the win is important to Edward Little.
“In the past, we haven’t done too good against them,” Clements said. “We knew this year was different and we were going to come out strong.
“We did.”
The Red Eddies controlled the play in their offensive zone for the majority of the first period. Morse put them up 1-0 when he crashed the net from the high slot buried a pass by Andrew Clements into the goal.
Morse said he was pumped to score in the first period of a game that featured a playoff-like environment inside The Colisee, with both schools having their own student sections.
“Both teams were coming out hard and fast; the pressure was on,” Morse said. “We found a way to get one early. We were putting the pressure on and they couldn’t do anything about it.”
Lewiston (3-2) struggled to adjust to the Eddies’ speed.
“EL was fast, they were on top of us in our defensive zone and we haven’t seen that speed yet,” Lewiston coach Jamie King said. “We had a hard time getting the puck out of the (defensive) zone, but it really shows what we need to work on.”
Before the end of the first period, Morse set up Gavin Levesque for a slap shot that beat Lewiston goalie Ben Cloutier to make it 2-0.
“That was huge,” Morse said of Levesque’s goal. “That made us keep going (to get more goals).”
Lewiston’s best opportunity in the game came in the second period when it had a 5-on-3 for 63 seconds. They put a couple of shots on Red Eddies’ goalie Gage Ducharme, but Ducharme stopped each one.
“If we get (a goal), we can hang around, but we didn’t score,” King said. “The kids started gripping their sticks a little more tighter and doing things on their own.”
That penalty kill was big for the Red Eddies.
“We took the momentum throughout the game,” Edward Little coach Gagne said. “On that 5-on-3 (penalty kill), we killed it and we did a real good job of it. We had some opportunities to score on it, but we never relinquished the momentum. That’s the key because momentum can change like that.”
Ducharme made 12 saves in the game.
Wesley Clements scored with under 30 seconds remaining in the second period for a 3-0 lead.
“I think the backbreaker was the third one with 27 seconds left,” Gagne said. “… That was big for us to get one (at the end of the period.”
The Red Eddies continued to add goals in the third period. Peyton Dyer scored an unassisted goal to make it 4-0 and Trey Coulombe notched the fifth goal with 30 seconds remaining.
King said Edward Little took advantage of Lewiston at the end of each period.
“The kids are tired; we just got to hold on,” King said. “You hate to give up goals late in the period, but it happens.”
Ben Cloutier made 17 saves for Lewiston.
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