LEWISTON — Andy Moore recorded a hat trick and top-seeded Greely of Cumberland advanced to the Class B South boys’ hockey final with a 10-1 victory Saturday over No. 5 Gorham at the Androscoggin Bank Colisee.
The score got out of hand in the third period, with the Rangers (17-2) tallying seven goals.
“I’m not walking out of here walking on air,” said Greely Coach Barry Mothes, whose team had to kill a pair of 5-on-3 situations in the first two periods with the score still close. “We spent way too much time either killing penalties or a man up. We really weren’t able to get into a nice bang-bang-bang, three-line rhythm the way we like to.”
Greely (17-2) will play No. 2 Cape Elizabeth at 7 p.m. Wednesday in Lewiston. It’ll be a rematch of last year’s regional final, which Greely won, 3-2.
Gorham, which lost for the third time this season to Greely, finishes 11-9.
The tide turned early in the second period. Moore had staked Greely to a 1-0 lead, but the Rangers incurred two penalties in the final minute and faced the prospect of a two-man disadvantage for a minute and 25 seconds after intermission.
However, the Rams were hit with a delay of game infraction before the puck even dropped, making it a 5-on-4 power play instead.
“The time just got away from us,” Gorham senior Nick Gray said. “It didn’t really slow us down. It more so made us a little bit angry.”
A Moore tripping penalty in the opening minute put a third Ranger in the box, but Greely took advantage of a subsequent 4-on-4 situation to spring Jake MacDonald for a breakaway goal.
Later in the period, Gorham enjoyed a 5-on-3 advantage for 1:29 but couldn’t convert.
Sophomore goalie Jared Swisher made 25 saves for Greely. The only goal he allowed came in the final minute of the second period on a long slap shot by Gray that deflected off a Rangers defender and made it 3-1.
“I thought he found a way to collect some pucks when he had a lot of traffic in front of him,” Mothes said. “They were clogging the low slot and he did a great job looking through arms and legs and making pucks stick to him.”
McDonald’s second goal made it 3-0 with 53 seconds left in the second period.
The third period was all Greely. After a little more than a minute, Jackson Williams tucked home the rebound of a shot by Owen O’Connell to make it 4-1. Gorham switched goalies, replacing freshman Caleb Waterman (17 saves) with senior Giuseppe Brown, but the Rangers poured in six goals in the final 7:34.
MacDonald and Williams each scored twice. Lattanzi, Alexander Wallace and Chris Williams also scored.
“We’ve been working hard on our conditioning the last month or so,” Mothes said, “and I think we had more left in the tank in the third.”
Glenn Jordan can be contacted at 791-6425 or:
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