Davis brothers lead Old Town-Orono hockey past Brewer
Jan. 23—ORONO, Maine — The Davis brothers, senior Jacob and sophomore Dylan, certainly have a connection on the ice because they grew up playing hockey together.
And when a new center was installed on their line for the Old Town-Orono Black Bears in junior Ian Bouchard, they never missed a beat.
Left wing Jacob Davis registered his first career hat trick and he also had an assist; Bouchard scored his first two goals of the season and right wing Dylan Davis had a goal and two assists as the Black Bears beat Brewer 7-1 at Alfond Arena Saturday night.
Adam Henderson scored the other goal for the Black Bears.
Grady Vanidestine scored the Brewer goal just 30 seconds into the game.
The Black Bears improved to 7-1 with their fifth straight win while the Witches fell to 1-6.
Bouchard replaced Blaine Murray, who was sidelined due to COVID-19 contact tracing.
"We got good in practice. We got to know each other," Jacob Davis said. "Dylan and I are on the same page a lot so it was pretty easy to fill Ian in and get him on the same page. And he played great. We were flowing, which is good, and we communicated."
"It was great," Dylan Davis said. "It's tough to have someone out but we always have a guy ready to step into any kind of role."
Bouchard had been centering the third line so Old Town-Orono coach Chris Thurlow moved him up to the Davis line when Murray was unavailable.
"Ian has a good slot presence and his two goals came from the slot. He also works hard and he's a good offensive player," Thurlow said. "That line played well tonight."
The Black Bears received an early wake-up call when sophomore left wing Vanidestine tipped Jed Gilpatrick's low wrist shot up into the short side corner on the game's first shift. It was his fourth goal of the season.
But the defending three-time Class B North champions wasted little time responding and establishing a foothold in the game.
Jacob Davis sandwiched his first two goals around Bouchard's first goal, during a span of 3:58 later in the first period.
Brewer goalie Ethan Hanscom made a pair of saves off the Davis brothers before Jacob came out of the corner to Hanscom's right and beat him with a wrist shot to the blocker side from the top of the faceoff circle.
"My coach [Old Town-Orono assistant Cory Thibodeau] always tells me when you come out of the corner, there's always a good seam at the top of the circle," said Jacob Davis, who observed that Brewer's forwards were covering his point men, which gave him some open ice.
"So I took the seam and I looked top left and shot it just to get it on net," he added.
It was his fifth goal of the season and came 3:09 into the period.
Just 2:32 later, Bouchard put the Black Bears ahead to stay as he was camped at the far post and a Jacob Davis pass made its way to him off a deflection. Bouchard deposited it into the short side.
The fleet-skating Jacob Davis made it 3-1 at the 7:07 mark off a three-on-two.
He sliced his way across the middle of the slot from left to right and snapped a wrist shot from the right circle through Hanscom's pads.
Bouchard was set up nicely by Chase Campbell in the second period as he simply directed Campbell's cross-ice pass out from the corner inside the near post.
Brewer had a golden opportunity to climb back into the game later in the second period when Old Town-Orono's Jackson Lizotte received a five-minute major for contact to the head on Hunter Merrithew, who left the game with a possible concussion, according to Brewer coach Lance Ingerson.
The Black Bears limited Brewer to three shots on goal during the power play and senior goalie Rowen Fremouw stopped all of them.
Dylan Davis made it 5-1 on the power play later in the period when Tyler Kenney got it down to him from the point through a maze of players and he wheeled around and backhanded it into the vacant net for his seventh goal of the season.
Kenney also assisted on Henderson's fifth of the season in the third period coming on the power play before Jacob Davis completed his hat trick with 22 seconds left after Hanscom had made three terrific saves in a row.
Fremouw was sharp in net, stopping 14 shots in posting the win.
Hanscom played well in defeat, turning aside 30 shots.
"We didn't play to the top of our ability. We didn't pressure them. We didn't compete," Ingerson said. "Old Town-Orono played well."
