Class B boys’ hockey state championship: Roderigue, Waterville topple Yarmouth in 2OT

LEWISTON — Andrew Roderigue was on the giving end all night for Waterville.

On the game-winning goal, he finally got his chance to receive a pass, and didn’t waste the opportunity.

Roderigue gathered a point-to-point pass, wheeled and fired a shot from the right side that eluded Yarmouth goalie Dan Latham, lifting the Purple Panthers a 3-2, double-overtime victory over the Clippers in the Class B boys’ hockey state championship game at the Androscoggin Bank Colisee on Saturday afternoon.

“Honestly, I didn’t even think it was real,” Roderigue said. “I didn’t know what was going on.”

Roderigue dished out assists on Waterville’s first two goals, which rallied the North champion Purple Panthers (19-1-1) back from an early 2-0 deficit. Less than three minutes into the second eight-minute overtime the junior defenseman took a pass from classmate and fellow blue-liner Matt Jolicoeur from left to right. Roderigue turned and fired on net, and Latham couldn’t respond to the shot before it hit the back of the net.

“It was a one-timer,” Roderigue said. “Got it off as quick as I can, and it went in.”

The Purple Panthers nearly ended the game less than a minute into the first overtime, but Michael Oliveira’s re-direct of Jolicoeur’s point shot rang off the top-left corner of the goal frame. Waterville goalie Nathan Pinnette later made a pair of saves in a matter of seconds to help send the game to a second overtime.

The game was the second meeting of the season between the No. 1 teams in their respective regions. Like in that first game, the South champion Clippers (16-5) got off to a surprising 2-0 lead against the flow of the game, which otherwise favored Waterville.

The Panthers were dominating possession and had an advantage in shots on net, but Yarmouth broke the ice first. With the Clippers defending their own zone on a penalty kill, Walter Conrad blocked a shot in the slot and started a 2-on-1 with teammate Patrick Grant going the other way. Grant passed it back to Conrad in the offensive zone and Conrad fired a shot in tight on Pinnette. Grant shoveled the rebound into the cage to net the shorthanded goal.

Noah Grondin made it 2-0 with just over three minutes left in the first, stealing the puck just outside the Waterville zone and sniping a shot from the top of the left circle that snuck inside the top-right corner of the goal.

“We knew when we got up on them it wasn’t going to be the end of the hockey game,” Yarmouth coach David St. Pierre said.

Waterville finally got on the board to cut the deficit in half less than a minute later. Roderigue saucered the puck from from the left side to Michael Bolduc, who beat Latham at the left post.

While the Purple Panthers dictated play in the first period, it was the Clippers who did so in the second. Just as St. Pierre had planned.

“We actually talked a lot about second period,” St. Pierre said. “It was kind of one of their stronger periods throughout the course of the year, and it was one of our weaker periods.”

The second period was where Waterville struck to win the regular-season matchup. Saturday, neither team scored in the middle frame, though it’s where the Panthers’ comeback started. The middle period saw Waterville whistled for three penalties, two of which came 29 seconds apart in the final two minutes.

The Clippers put four shots on net before the end of the period, and still carried 22 seconds of the 5-on-3 and 52 seconds of power play overall into the third.

But the Panthers stood their ground and held Yarmouth without a shot to start the third period.

“We knew we had to kill those two,” Waterville coach Dennis Martin said. “It was a big penalty kill.”

“That was tough. I thought we had a good opportunity there,” St. Pierre said. “Credit to Waterville, they killed that penalty really well. They were aggressive when they had to be.”

Martin said there’s “no quit” to his team. The Panthers proved that, putting nine shots on net in the third. Only one went in, but that’s all they needed.

The play, naturally, started with Roderigue, who fired a shot from the left that Latham saved with his left leg. But freshman Cooper Hart was there to get the rebound in the right circle and beat Latham on the second-chance shot.

“Cooper came in after (Jackson Aldrich) got hurt,” Roderigue said. “He came through for us. Very nice one-timer.”

The Clippers did their job in stopping Roderigue, but Hart hustled to the rebound before it could get cleared away.

“We talked about (Roderigue) this week in practice, about trying to shut him down,” St. Pierre said. “He’s a hell of a hockey player.”

Yarmouth could only stop Roderigue for so long. That time ran out 55 minutes into an instant classic.

“With him shooting it, doesn’t surprise me,” Martin said.

The title is the Purple Panthers’ first in Class B, after winning 20 in Class A. It’s Waterville’s first state title in any class since 2009.

“It’s awesome bringing the trophy back to Waterville,” said Roderigue, who is just a junior. “The whole team worked their butt off.”

wkramlich@sunjournal.com