LEWISTON — Lewiston jumped out to a 2-0 lead after the first period, and things were looking good for Class A’s top seed in Saturday’s quarterfinal at the Androscoggin Bank Colisee.
The second period wasn’t so easy. The Blue Devils still went on to win 6-0, but they had to weather a strong start to the middle frame by Bangor.
At one point in the second, the Rams held a 6-3 shot advantage.
Ben St. Laurent, far left, of Lewiston High School celebrates his second-period goal against Bangor in a Class A quarterfinal on Saturday at the Androscoggin Bank Colisee. Daryn Slover/Sun Journal Buy this Photo
“We had some energy back early in the second, we got out there and we had a good first five minutes,” Bangor coach Quinn Paradis said. “We tried to break the period down (into segments) — win five minutes then win the next five minutes. We won 10 minutes, and the last four were a little sloppy. The third period kind of unraveled on us.”
Lewiston coach Jamie Belleau expected Bangor to come out strong in the second period.
“Throughout the season, you have up and downs, but we have more ups than downs,” Belleau said. “We want to minimize our downs, but the regular season you can learn from those things. This is the playoffs, when you go up 2-0, you expect the other to make a push.
“You have to weather the storm in the regular season, at times. If anything, that helped us prepare for that. Playoff hockey, very rarely the game goes the way you want it to go from the beginning to the end.”
Lewiston senior forward Kurtis Pelletier said that when the Blue Devils have a down period it’s usually because they aren’t playing focused hockey.
“When we lose our composure, we just have to get it back together,” Pelletier said.
Belleau was pleased with the way with the Blue Devils kept their heads in the game and didn’t take a bad penalty. Their only penalty came in the the first period.
Meanwhile, Lewiston goaltender Keegan McLaughlin made eight of his 15 saves in the middle frame.
Belleau said McLaughlin was in his element during the second period
“He’s been good all year, and he’s a competitor,” Belleau said. “You guys don’t get to see him every day like I do. There’s been times when a kid has taken a shot and (it) went bar-down — he thought he should have saved it. He’s been really good for us back there. I am not surprised, he certainly helped us out in the second period.”
Ben St. Laurent scored for the Blue Devils to push the lead to 3-0 with 2:48 remaining in the period.
Eight seconds later, Bangor’s Aidan Scripture took an unsportsmanlike penalty, and Logan Tripp scored on Lewiston’s power play to stretch the lead to 4-0.
Paradis said the penalty might have taken the wind out of the Rams’ sails.
The Blue Devils, on the other hand, loosened up after the fourth goal.
“After those two goals, it felt like a little bit of our weight shifted off our shoulder,” Pelletier said. “We didn’t stop there, we kept pushing through.”
In the third period, the Blue Devils were back to playing strong hockey, as they did during the their unbeaten regular season. They outshot the Rams 22-2 in the period and added two more goals for the 6-0 victory.
Send questions/comments to the editors.
