The Lewiston and St. Dom’s boys hockey programs will need to find new head coaches for the 2024-25 season.

Jamie King, who led Lewiston (17-4) to its 25th state championship in March and won the Bobby Boucher Coach for the Year Award as the best coach in Class A this season, has stepped down after three seasons leading the Blue Devils.

Dan D’Auteuil also has resigned after five seasons leading St. Dominic Academy. He was an assistant under his predecessor, Bobby Parker, and took over for Parker the season after the Saints won their 26th state championship in 2019.

Both cited more responsibilities in their day jobs as the primary reason for their resignations.

“Everyone knows coaching high school hockey is very time-consuming,” King said. “You are usually spending over 500 hours a year doing that — as far as practicing, planning, summer (hockey) — and because of my work, I had to step down to focus on my business.”

King runs Rehabilitation Equipment Associates in Lewiston, and will be opening a second store soon in Portland.

Lewiston athletic director Jason Fuller said commended King for leading the Blue Devils to another state championship after a four-year drought.

“That’s all you can ask any coach to do, is to battle every day, to make adjustments in the season and after the season,” Fuller said. “I think the product this season was the result of that. He looked at ways to do things differently through the season, and the result was us having the success that we did. It’s a direct result to his growth.

“You know, it takes a while, being an assistant, and being a head coach is another (thing). What you saw is someone coming into it, getting himself anchored, and finding ways to make the kids more successful on the ice.”

King went 34-25-1 as head coach after being hired to replace Jamie Belleau in 2021. King was on Belleau’s coaching staff when Lewiston won four state championships in five years from 2016-20 and got

King noted nothing off the ice was a factor in his decision to resign.

“I do well handling adversity,” King said. “It’s being honest with everybody as far as what their game play is. So, parent-wise, like I said, that wasn’t the reasoning. I do definitely know how to communicate with the families, but as far as the business side, that’s the next step for me to be more successful with my business is to open a new location, is the number one reason.”

D’Auteuil is a lawyer and a partner at Skelton Taintor & Abbott in Lewiston.

“My workload has doubled in the last couple of years,” D’Auteuil said. “It was too difficult to do both jobs. I think high school coaching takes a lot of time, and if you are going to do the job right, it takes an ample amount of time.”

D’Auteuil said he also wants to spend more time with his family.

The Saints went 37-45-3 during his five seasons as head coach.

“We had some tough, lean years,” D’Auteuil said. “I remember one year we had 13 kids on the roster, and it has been a battle of numbers the entire time. We had the COVID year, which was tough. The program is starting to take a step forward. We had a great season this year, and we ran into that hot goalie.”

The Saints (13-4-2) finished second in the Class A Heal point standings but were upset by seventh-seeded Portland/South Portland/Deering/Waynflete in the quarterfinals when Michael Zaccaria made 45 saves in a 2-1 win.

Timothee Ouellette, who led St. Dom’s in points this season, became the school’s fourth Travis Roy Award winner.

“Dan has been a big piece of our program overall over his time at Dom’s,” St. Dom’s athletic director Brandon Rogers said. “He’s instrumental in our growth on and off the ice. I appreciate him and I appreciate the relationship I had with him. He will be heavily missed.”

D’Auteuil said he received positive messages when he announced to players and parents that he was stepping down.

“I was very surprised. I received a lot of nice, congratulatory thank yous from most of those players,” D’Auteuil said. “I had a few conversations with some of them. I had a lot of good responses from the parents. The reaction was better than expected.”

D’Auteuil mentioned the response from the players and parents made the decision to step down even tougher.

King said he planned to meet the team on Monday to inform them of his decision to step down. Word had gotten out about his decision and he had spoken to a few players before Monday’s meeting.

“I have communicated with some of them because they reach out to me a lot to find out about their game, what their future (is), and what they want to do,” King said Saturday. “Some of the players do know, but not all of them.”

WHAT’S NEXT?

Fuller and Rogers both said they want to get a replacement hired soon.

“Sooner, the better. It’s the end of April here, summer is coming up,” Fuller said. “I would like to get someone in place for the kids and allow them to work with them in the summer, do what they want to do, develop relationships, and work toward next season.”

Rogers said D’Auteuil’s replacement is expected in the coming week. He also said the program is in good shape.

“We are excited, we have some good enrollment numbers,” Rogers said. “We have good numbers coming in to keep us competitive year in and year out.”

The hiring process is a little more challenging this season, with all three Lewiston-Auburn boys teams looking for a new coach. Edward Little’s Norm Gagne retired after 50 years behind a high school bench the Red Eddies’ season ended.

“It’s not easy, it’s always challenging to find quality coaches,” Fuller said. “It’s not 30 years ago when a job opens up, you have 25 applicants. That’s not happening at any level, any sport.”

Edward Little athletic director Todd Sampson told the Sun Journal in a text message that the Red Eddies have had a great applicant pool. Sampson is looking to do interviews during the second week of May.

The most recent case where all three schools had head coaching openings at the same time was in 2005. Bobby Boucher stepped down at St. Dom’s after 25 years coaching the Saints and long-time assistant John Pleau took over. Gagne became Lewiston’s coach when Tim Smith stepped down after five seasons. Craig Latuscha was promoted by Edward Little after Belleau led the Red Eddies to back-to-back Class A state championships in 2003 and 2004.

“There are plenty of jobs out there,” Fuller said. “People can be a little more picky in what they want to do. I am concerned about it, but we will find a coach who wants to be a part of our family, our tradition, and our program.”

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