AUBURN — It was a good result for the Leavitt boys’ hockey team Saturday night.

The Hornets built an early lead and secured a 4-4 tie, but it might have been an even better result for the team from Fryeburg-Lake Region. The Ice Cats were down 4-2 and still earned a tie against the Hornets.

“It feels like a win,” said Ice Cats coach Dave Lepage. “The key this year is always going to be scoring goals, and we had good production tonight.”

Leavitt appeared to be in good shape with the two-goal lead, but the Hornets couldn’t put it away. When Leavitt had ample power plays late in regulation, the game-winner just wouldn’t come.

“It’s one we should have won but at least we came out with a tie,” said Leavitt coach Dave Boucher. “When a goalie plays that well, and you get four goals, it’s nice.”

Tyler Hutchinson had three goals for Leavitt while Nick Allen had the other. The Ice Cats got goals from Mike LeGoff, Evan Kellough, Dakota Russo and Mason LaPlante.

Ice Cat goalie Topi Laakso faced 40 shots and made 36 saves. He was superb late as Leavitt threatened with two late power plays.

“Their goalie played a great game,” said Boucher. “We’re going to have to work hard to get the goals we have. We had some really nice goals. In the overtime, we had three opportunities one-on-one and he made the saves.”

Leavitt goalie Andrew Baumann was playing his first varsity game in net. He faced 19 shots and made 15 saves. The last shot the Ice Cats got, however, was a LaPlante dump in from the blue line that snuck past Baumann for the tying goal with 10:10 left.

“He did pretty well for his first game,” said Boucher. “He made a couple nice saves. That last goal, he thought it was going wide. That’s why he didn’t react.”

Leavitt had two power plays late in regulation and produced four straight shots at one point but couldn’t beat Laakso. Then in overtime, the Ice Cats had a power-play chance but came up empty. Leavitt finished with a flurry of chances and hit the post on one try. Blayne Arsenault had a nice bid that was saved. Hutchinson beat a defender and had the goalie down but couldn’t lift it by him.

“We were able to bear down when we needed to,” said Lepage. “They had some power play where they didn’t even come into the zone. The trap seemed to work well for us.”

The Ice Cats scored just 31 seconds into the game on a LeGoff goal. Leavitt answered at 2:08 with a Hutchinson writer from the right circle. He then put the Hornets up 2-0 with 2:56 remaining with a backhander. Adam Poulin assisted on both Leavitt goals.

In the second, at 6:30, Allen, the regular netminder, scored to make it 3-1. The Ice Cats got one back from Kellough just 17 seconds later. Then Hutchinson made it 4-2 with 4:28 left after a Poulin rush.

The Ice Cats closed the gap 3:22 into the third when Russo chipped one into the top of the net.

“If we could have gotten up 5-2, that would have taken the wind out of their sails,” said Boucher. “They got the momentum with that third goal.”

kmills@sunjournal.com