Adam Longchamps’ two goals help put Lewiston over the top against Cony.
By Justin Pelletier
Staff Writer

LEWISTON – It wasn’t quite as close as the last game between the two teams, but Cony didn’t exactly bow down to Lewiston, either.

The Blue Devils received two goals from Adam Longchamps to go with 11 saves by Nick Langlais as they beat the Rams 5-2 in an Eastern Class A hockey quarterfinal game at the Colisee Monday night.

With the win, Lewiston moves on to face Bangor in the semifinals Saturday.

“This reminded me a lot of the last time,” Lewiston coach Tim Smith said. “They had few chances, but that capitalized on them, and actually almost got us shorthanded twice.”

With just a two-goal lead heading into the final period, Lewiston was on the brink of allowing a comeback.

Enter Longchamps, who scored the Devils’ fourth goal late in the second. After being denied on the doorstep, Longchamps held tight on the left post. His rebound fluttered out to Scott Geoffroy in the high slot. Geoffroy skated to the right post and slid a pass back across the crease to Longchamps, who slammed the puck into the empty net.

“He’s stepped it up the last couple of weeks for us,” Smith said. “That helped us out a lot.”

Penalties threatened to get the best of Lewiston in the final 10 minutes, but the Blue Devils killed off three Cony power plays, including a 5-on-3, to preserve the win.

“I’m not so concerned about penalties late in a game when it’s a 5-2 game, and when they are being called to keep the rough stuff down,” Smith said. “I would have been more concerned with penalties like that if it was a 3-3 game.”

In an otherwise sloppy first period, Lewiston had two solid scoring chances and converted on both.

Just 2:35 into the game, Matt Morgan carried the puck to the Cony blue line. Just as he was about to get clobbered by a Rams defenseman, Morgan shuffled the puck across the blue line to Jason Dube. Dube carried the it toward goaltender Mike Lovaglio and waited until the last possible moment before flipping a pass back across the crease to Tyler Richard, who pinched in from the left point. Richard tipped the puck past Lovaglio for the goal.

As time wound down in the first frame, Eric Grenier took a long pass from Tim Roy at the Cony blue line and went in alone on Lovaglio, choosing the low blocker side on his wrist shot. The puck slid past the netminder, adding insurance to the Blue Devils’ lead.

“I think we came out of the gate well tonight,” Smith said. “Tyler had a good goal, and it was good to see Kyle (Beaulieu) get his first as a Blue Devil, too, although that was in the second.”

Cony asserted itself in the second period, twice pulling to within a goal.

Twenty-eight seconds into the period, J.P. Carey surprised Langlais after two Lewiston defenders collided, leaving the puck sitting in the low slot. Carey took one step to the right and slid the puck past Langlais on the ice low to the glove side.

The Blue Devils momentarily reestablished its two-goal cushion at 5:39 thanks to a Kyle Beaulieu shot from the high slot that found its way through a heavy screen, but Cony would not go away.

Dane Wing, who had an assist on the first Rams’ goal, got one of his own when he outmuscled Richard for the puck while forechecking on the penalty kill. With one arm still tied up with Richard, Wing slid a weak backhander into the lower right corner of the net, just inside the post, to pull the Rams to 3-2.

Lewiston added its fourth of the night when Longchamps took a quick offensive zone faceoff win by Dube and rifled a wrist shot just under the crossbar in the left corner.

jpelletier