LEWISTON – You snooze, you lose.

In the span of less than a minute, the Lewiston boys’ lacrosse team turned a tight game into a relatively easy 7-2 victory Saturday morning.

With three goals to start the second half, the Blue Devils caught Mt. Ararat napping and the Eagles never recovered.

“It took about a minute, and we got a couple of goals and right away the game was done,” said Lewiston’s Tim Gilbert, who had two goals and two assists. “They weren’t ready to play that half. One defenseman didn’t even have his gloves on, and that’s how we scored.”

Goals by Jon Roy, Jake LaRoche and Gilbert sparked five straight tallies by Lewiston in the second half to put the Blue Devils in the driver’s seat. Mt. Ararat managed a second goal in the fourth but after being stunned in that first minute, the Eagles never recovered.

“It’s a game of runs and all of a sudden your mind goes blank and then it goes from 2-1 to 5-1,” said Lewiston coach Tom Fournier. “It’s a new game. Then we can be patient offensively, and we can pass the ball. It’s a big difference.”

The win solidifies Lewiston’s position in the Eastern A standings. The Blue Devils (9-1) were ranked second in the latest Heals with Mt. Ararat (7-3) right behind them. It puts Lewiston in position to challenge for a spot in the KVAC championship game.

“I think we have the inside track by winning today,” said Fournier. “We lose that game and they win, they’d be pretty close.”

Instead, Lewiston has a shot and making its first appearance in a conference title match, something the team has been shooting for.

“We’ve never made it to the KVAC championship,” said Gilbert. “I think we’re on track to do that. We made it to the (state) finals last year, but didn’t get to the KVAC’s. So that’s our goal this year. Then after that, obviously, we want to get as far as we can.”

Goals by Roy and Craig Sirois had Lewiston up 2-1 at the half, but the Blue Devils felt it should have been more.

“We didn’t know why it was so close,” said Gilbert. “We were like ‘Come on, let’s pull together.’ So we came out flying.”

Lewiston was playing a bit shorthanded because of injuries and only had two lines of midfielders. The Blue Devils created ample pressure in the opening half but just didn’t finish.

“We had great looks offensively in the first half,” said Fournier. “We just didn’t catch the ball. We had cutters that were open and threw the ball right to their sticks. We didn’t hang onto it. Offensively, we were doing the right things. If we caught the ball a little better, we knew we’d still have some good offensive chances and we did.”

Lewiston scored right off the opening face-off of the second half. A Blauvelt win set up a pass by Gilbert to Roy for the 3-1 lead.

“He’s done a great job on the face-offs,” said Fournier. “Four or five games ago something clicked. He’s won a ton of face-offs. That’s key for us. Those are all extra possessions.”

Lewiston kept the pressure on and scored twice in transition. After scoring in the opening seconds, LaRoche and Gilbert each scored in the first minute.

“All those came off face-offs or in transition,” said Fournier. “That was huge. I told the kids after that it’s a different game if we take out those 53 seconds. It changed the whole nature of the game.”

The Blue Devils added other goals by Gilbert and Roy to finish the third quarter up 7-1.

“We knew it should not be that close,” said Gilbert, whose team beat Mt. Ararat 8-5 earlier in the year. “We just came out shooting and scoring and hustling and winning the ball all over the field. We started playing Lewiston lacrosse and started scoring goals.”