HALLOWELL — Derek Fournier gets the bulk of the headlines at Bangor High School, and deservedly so.
The senior goaltender was selected last summer in the 13th round of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League draft by the Saint John Sea Dogs, and the Maine Moose netminder has been the backbone of a Bangor team that went 11-7-0 this season and grabbed the No. 2 seed in the Class A North playoffs. He posted a 1.88 goals against average and a .918 save percentage for a team that won four straight to close out the regular season.
But not far behind has been Cony/Hall-Dale/Monmouth junior Dalton Bowie. Bowie went 13-4-0 and posted a similar goals against average (1.83) and save percentage (.915) to Fournier.
Of all Class A goaltenders to play at least 500 minutes this season, Fournier and Bowie rank first and third, respectively.
The two will square off in the Class A North semifinals at noon Saturday at the Androscoggin Bank Colisee in Lewiston.
“We know they’ve got a strong goaltender,” Cony coach Chad Foye said of Bangor. “Their top line is really good, and the other two lines they play are good. It’s a pretty deep team.”
No. 3 Cony (14-5-0) has proven to have a fairly deep team itself, no surprise considering it was holding onto the No. 2 spot — and the first-round bye that went with it — right into the final week of the regular season. The Rams didn’t get the bye, but they did look impressive in an 8-4 win over No. 6 Edward Little on Tuesday.
Cony and Bangor met once during the regular season with Bangor posting a 3-1 win on Jan. 16. Both Fournier and Bowie made 22 saves in the contest, but a pair of Kodi Legassie goals on the power play proved the difference.
“We’ve got to do better creating opportunities, obviously,” Foye said. “We can’t give them opportunities, as well. We’ve got to work a little harder, work a little smarter. We’re playing better than we were the first time, so hopefuly that carries through a little bit more.”
Cony scored just 22 goals in its first seven games of the season, and six times scored two or fewer goals. But over their last four contests — including the playoff win over the Eddies — the Rams are averaging 8.25 goals per game.
One big reason for that surge has been the play of the team’s defensemen, junior Tyler Dostie and senior Thomas Arps both finding more chances to jump into the attack.
Arps scored twice in a win over Poland/Leavitt/Oak Hill/Gray-New Gloucester, while Dostie had three assists in Tuesday’s playoff win.
“We’re getting more used to our ‘D’ partners, we’re getting better relationships,” Dostie said. “We started off a little rough, but we’ve picked it up.”
Penalties have been a thorn in Cony’s side. In the Rams’ quarterfinal win, three of the four Edward Little goals came via the power play — and the fourth was scored just seconds after a Cony penalty expired.
In all, Cony was whisted for more than 200 minutes in penalties this season. By contrast, Bangor was called for just six minor penalties in total through 18 games — made all the more significant by their own power play clicking along at nearly a 23 percent success rate.
“I think we’ve just got to clean up what we did (against Edward Little),” Foye said. “There’s a couple of small adjustments we’ve got to make with a couple of things, but I don’t think it’s anything real serious. We don’t have to do a lot different.”
In the other game Saturday, No. 1 Lewiston (17-1-0) meets rival St. Dominic (9-10-0).
Travis Barrett — 621-5621
tbarrett@centralmaine.com
Twitter: @TBarrettGWC
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