After a lackluster effort in their most recent home game, the Portland Pirates are hoping they can get back on track — and back into the win column — on Friday.

“It would certainly be nice to get a win Friday, that’s for sure,” Pirates coach Ray Edwards said.

The Pirates didn’t lose a game in regulation at home through the month of December, and carried that into January, going 4-0-0-3 in seven games. But more recently, the Pirates have struggled to find the win column, despite playing “well,” according to Edwards.

“We can’t let ourselves get too caught up in what happened Tuesday,” Edwards said. “We had been playing well if not getting wins before that. I thought we really played well against Norfolk, and against Wilkes-Barre/Scranton, we just didn’t get the wins in those games. The important thing to remember is this doesn’t go back three, four, five games. The problem is, we lost a couple of games where we played well, then threw up a stinker. We just have to get back to playing the way we were before.”

The Pirates welcome a familiar foe to the Androscoggin Bank Colisee on Friday to begin a stretch of three games in three days as the Bridgeport Sound Tigers return to Lewiston for the second time in four weeks. The Pirates topped Bridgeport on New Year’s Eve, 4-2, and then again on the road on Jan. 11, 2-0.

Ryan Strome leads the Sound Tigers with 36 points, though he’s amassed that total in only 26 games. Anders Lee is second on the squad with 32 points in 42 games.

Former Maine Black Bears Joe Diamond and Mike Cornell have eight points each for Bridgeport. The Sound Tigers have won two of four, with goalie Parker Milner, formerly of Boston College, picking up both wins. Kenny Reiter has suffered both defeats.

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