Sam Cloutier is the new Lewiston High School boys hockey coach. He posed for some photos at the Blue Devils’ home rink, The Colisée in Lewiston, on Friday. Daryn Slover/Sun Journal

Sam Cloutier is excited to be back with the Lewiston boys hockey program.

The 2011 Lewiston High School graduate, who is a physical education teacher and assistant athletic director at the school, will be the Blue Devils’ next head coach.

Cloutier takes over for Jamie King, who resigned in April after leading Lewiston to the Class A state championship.

“As you know, I was coaching the boys lacrosse program this past season,” Cloutier said. “But the hockey position opened up, and having played for the program and been a part of that tradition for a long time. I was really excited to throw my name in the hat for the position, and I was lucky enough that Mr. (Jason) Fuller gave me the job. So I’m really happy to be coming back home to Lewiston and coaching the hockey program, for sure.”

Fuller, Lewiston’s athletic director, said Cloutier is the right man for the job.

“He’s a guy that understands high school sports and understands the values we’re trying to teach kids on a regular basis,” Fuller said. “It’s not always about, you know, the wins and the losses as much as it is some of those soft skills that matter. I think Sam has a very good feel for what we’re looking for with our head coaches and what we want to do moving forward. I think, Sam is an alum, he knows the value of the program and how important hockey is at the high school, and he’s an individual (who) had a very positive experience here at Lewiston. He wants to give back to create some positive memories for the kids that play.”

This past spring, Cloutier was named the interim boys lacrosse coach after the previous coach, Ben Fournier, and his assistant coaches stepped down midseason.

Cloutier said he won’t coach the boys varsity lacrosse team in 2025 because he said coaching two varsity teams will be difficult while trying to spend time with his family.

Sam Cloutier is the new Lewiston High School boys hockey coach. Cloutier is shown here at The Colisée with his 1-year-old son. Daryn Slover/Sun Journal

Coaching hockey is something Cloutier hasn’t done much of, but has some high school hockey experience working with the South Portland program when he was an assistant AD at that school.

“I did some coaching, some camps, and things like that,” Cloutier said. “But I did do a little bit at South Portland. There were a few times that I stepped in and went on the bench there, but in terms of being part of a program — it’s been a little while.”

The lack of hockey coaching experience isn’t a concern for Fuller.

“I think Sam is the guy that has played at the high school level, played at the college level, been around college athletics, been around high school athletics,” Fuller said. “He knows how to develop an unbelievably great relationship with kids. Who cares if you haven’t been, you know, coached a lot of hockey and haven’t been the head guy? If you can have those traits and you understand what the end result is and how to build relationships with kids, he’s going to be fine as a coach.”

When Cloutier was a sophomore, he was on Jamie Belleau’s first team at Lewiston, and Cloutier has reached out to his former coach.

“I have talked to Jamie Belleau,” Cloutier said. “You know, he’s excited for me. Jamie ran a really good program for Lewiston. So, you know, taking a lot of those things that he did and implementing those, and then building off some of my own things that I’ve learned playing for other teams and other programs and whatnot.”

Fuller said Cloutier has plenty of people he can go to for advice for anything that comes up during the season.

After graduating with his Master’s degree from Springfield College in 2018, Cloutier became an assistant athletic director with South Portland High School before leaving for Lewiston for the start of the 2022-23 school year.

While Cloutier doesn’t have much ice hockey coaching experience, he thinks coaching lacrosse — he was Lewiston’s junior varsity coach starting with the 2023 season before his brief time coaching the varsity team, and he spent time coaching Wilbraham & Monson Academy in Massachusetts while at Springfield College — will help him along with his hockey playing experience.

“Like I’ve said, I have been a part of the program,” Cloutier said, “That program gave me a lot. I was a senior captain of that team. Came up just short (of winning a state championship) my senior year, but the friendships and the experiences and everything that I had that came from Lewiston hockey growing up, watching, it’s always had a close place in my heart. You know, I grew up playing hockey. Hockey was everything that I did. … So my path kind of transitioned to lacrosse for a little while there, but I’ve always had a place for hockey in my heart, and I’ve been wanting to get back into it.”

Sam Cloutier is the new Lewiston High School boys hockey coach. He posed for some photos at the Blue Devils’ home rink, The Colisée in Lewiston, on Friday. Daryn Slover/Sun Journal

Thornton Academy defeated Lewiston 4-3 in the 2011 Class A state championship game when 2012 Travis Roy Award winner C.J. Maksut scored the game-winner in double overtime.

Cloutier played a postgraduate season at Hebron Academy, where he was fourth in team scoring for the Lumberjacks with 10 goals and nine assists in 27 games. After Hebron, he played four years of lacrosse at the University of New England and one season with the school’s club hockey team. After UNE, he got his Master’s in Education at Springfield College in 2018.

Cloutier, 31, has already begun working with the hockey team this summer on and off the ice. He hasn’t yet met the entire team, with everyone having different summer obligations.

“We’ve been doing summer programming,” Cloutier said. “We’ve been doing some dry land sessions and some on-ice sessions with the kids. I’ve been fired up. The kids have been fired up. I’ve coached a lot of these kids in lacrosse. I’m a teacher in the building, so I know most of, if not all, of the kids already. I already have that relationship with them a little bit.”

The goal for Cloutier is to continue where King left off.

“Obviously a lot of these kids had a lot of success last year winning a state championship,” Cloutier said. “So, we’re just going to look to build off that and keep it rolling this year. (We) lost some good seniors, you know, but I think we have the pieces that are still here in place to kind of fill that void and keep moving and then, you know, be right in the hunt again this year.”