Black Hawks enjoy winning ways

    HOULTON, Maine — The Houlton/Hodgdon Black Hawks climbed above the .500 mark last week with a 9-2 victory over Orono and a 4-1 win over Hampden. The Black Hawks improved their record to 4-3 for the year.
    Against Orono, the Black Hawks gave up a goal with just 16 seconds into the game, but then pulled themselves together to score nine straight goals before giving up a tally with 22 seconds left in the game.
Ben Ward and Sam Fitzpatrick scored first-period goals to give the Black Hawks a 2-1 lead at the first intermission. Assists went to defensemen Jared Tapley and Kam Lincoln. In the second, the Black Hawks put up four more markers to take a 6-1 lead. Goals came off the sticks of Cody Briggs and Parker Sanderson, with Ward striking for two more for his first varsity hat trick. Assists went to Nick Chase with a pair, Briggs, Sanderson and Lincoln. In the third the Black Hawks added three as Logan Holmes hit the twine, Ward tallied his fourth goal of the game and Josh Bragan netted his first varsity goal.
Malik Abouleish and Avery Kibler combined for six saves on eight Red Riot shots and the Black Hawks put 40 shots on the Orono netminders.
The game Saturday against Hampden saw the Black Hawks take a 4-1 victory in a penalty-filled affair. The Orono game saw a total of only six penalties, according to Black Hawks coach Joel Trickey, but the officials saw fit to call 25 penalties in the Saturday matinee, with no noticeable difference in the play.
The Black Hawks took a 2-0 lead after one, as Dylan Gard hit for a pair of goals, both assisted by Ian Gervais. The second period saw Hampden pull back to within one, but Chase gave the Black Hawks back the two-goal lead with an assist from Briggs.
Neither team could stay out of the penalty box that period and the Black Hawks had an extended three-man penalty kill without giving up a goal. In the third period the two teams settled down and played relatively penalty-free hockey. Chase tallied his second goal of the game to give the Black Hawks the 4-1 win.
Abouleish stopped 30 of 31 shots and the Black Hawks put 29 shots on the Bronco goaltender.
“The team came together in these two games and are following our system much better.,” said Trickey. “Our tempo and aggressiveness are much better and we carried the play instead of letting the other team dictate the tempo.”
While the Black Hawks came out of the Orono game with only four penalties, the Hampden game was officiated much differently and it frustrated the team, said Trickey.
“We had the same problem with the same official in the Brewer game as every time we seemed to take control we ended up in the box,” he said. “The Hampden game was very chippy and it seemed that we were the only ones that ended up paying for the trash talk that for the most part was started by our opponents. I’m not condoning how our players acted and we have to have more control over our emotions and learn not to retaliate to be a successful team. Hopefully the kids will learn from this and play with more maturity for the rest of the season.”
The Black Hawks home contest against Lawrence should be a good test for them, as Lawrence is 7-1, stepping down from Class A to compete in Eastern B this season.