BIDDEFORD – With seven straight wins, the last three by shutout, the Scarborough boys’ hockey team knew a little about handling momentum as it entered Biddeford Ice Arena.
Grab it and hold it as long as you can. Because you’ll surely miss it when it’s gone.
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No need to remind Nick Bagley, who scored on the Red Storm’s first shot on goal, and Scarborough rode a dominating first period before holding on for a 3-0 victory over Biddeford in a Western Class A game Thursday night.
Bagley picked up a puck that bounced free from a scrum along the right-wing boards and fired past goalie Jon Fields (25 saves) to give Scarborough a 1-0 lead just 2:24 into the game.
“(Fields) was off his angle a little bit so I shot it far-side hoping for a rebound,” said Bagley, a defenseman. “It slipped past him and I was pretty happy about it.”
Fields was the star of the first period for the Tigers (3-4-1); the Red Storm (9-1) threw 15 more shots on net before the first intermission.
Scarborough had fewer chances in the second but made the most of two of them. Trevor Murray tipped in Ryan Bailer’s shot from the point at 5:33 for a 2-0 lead. Bagley started the play.
“I just try to create some scoring opportunities,” Bagley said. “It doesn’t matter who scores, we all just want the win.”
Five minutes later, Matt Henderson gave Scarborough a three-goal lead on a power play, finishing off nice passes from Cam Loiselle and Ian Morris.
Despite the score, Biddeford seemed to find its legs, limiting the Red Storm to six shots on goal.
“It takes us a while to realize we’re playing a game,” said Biddeford assistant coach Jeremy Grebin, who led the Tigers in the absence of Coach Rich Reissfelder, who was on a business trip. “In the second period there were stretches where we outplayed them, and outplayed them a little in the third. We just couldn’t score a goal.”
Scarborough had goalie Dalton Finley to thank for that. He made 10 of his 21 saves over the final 15 minutes, including several while Scarborough killed off a five-on-three power play.
Niklas Lemieux, Matt Jerome and Nate Crepeau tested Finley in close.
“Dalton came up big for us,” Scarborough Coach Norm Gagne said. “Give Biddeford credit. They battled back in the third.”
“They came out strong in the third,” Finley said, “but we stuck with it and got the win.”
The game proved a good lesson for the Red Storm.
“You can never feel comfortable,” Murray said. “We came out flat-footed in the third because we did get comfortable and we can’t have that. Biddeford was definitely outworking us, and we needed to refocus and we did that toward the end of the third.”
And when the Red Storm are focused, they’re tough to beat.
“They’re deep and they move zone to zone as a unit,” Grebin said. “When the puck is in your zone, all five guys seem to come into the zone at the same time. We wanted to play odd-man rushes, find the open guy, but there is no open guy. Everyone’s accounted for everywhere.”
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