February 4: Reign game breakdown

Reign game breakdown
The Reign were just 1:43 away from a victory against rival San Diego and instead, “gave away a win,” as categorized by head coach Mike Stothers in allowing a late goal by Kevin Roy and an overtime breakaway winner by Brandon Montour in a 4-3 loss to the Gulls on Friday night. In the first game following the All-Star break for both teams, the Reign charged to a 1-0 lead just 46 seconds in off a set faceoff play that resulted in an easy tap-in for T.J. Hensick. Former Reign Jordan Samuels-Thomas would score off a turnover and rush from the left wing at 6:25, resulting in a 1-1 score after one period. The Reign took control in the second period, holding San Diego to just three shots on goal and going ahead on a goal by Mike Amadio from the slot. When a crashing Nic Kerdiles hit in a rebound 3:35 into the third period the Reign were able to answer with a power play power move in front of the net by Justin Auger at 9:11. As the period wore on though San Diego continued to press and tied the game after pulling goalie Jhonas Enroth. Roy’s long shot from the point got through the glove side of Reign goalie Jack Campbell.

Best quote
Stothers’ explanation of what happened during a pause in play during the third period where the officials were looking at Enroth’s equipment: “I asked them to look at the flaps that [Enroth] had on either side of the outside of his knees. They stick straight out. They didn’t do anything about it. You’re supposed to have your equipment a certain way and I was kind of hoping we were going on a power play that they’d have to maybe take Enroth out, put the other guy in or have to fix the equipment. There’s flaps that are sticking straight out but I was told because it was flexible that it was allowed to stay. So, if tomorrow you see Soupy in net and he has an extra piece on the end of his blocker, as long as it’s flexible I guess he can keep it on there. Flexible. That’s the key word. I looked up flexible in the rule book, I couldn’t find it. Speaking of that rule book, that is a nightmare to try to find any rules.”

Three stars
–Brandon Montour – The Gulls’ All-Star defenseman cherry-picked his way to the game-winner as the Reign got caught with all three players below the tops of the circles sparking him to a clear breakaway on Campbell from the center red line in. Montour took the puck wide and then made a slight fake before sliding the puck five hole for his 12th goal of the season.
–Kevin Roy – Enroth had just hopped the San Diego bench when five seconds later Roy sent a long shot on net from the top of the point through traffic to tie the game. It was his 11th goal of the season.
–Mike Amadio – The rookie recorded his fifth multi-point game of the season by assisting on Auger’s power play goal in the third and scoring in the second period off a feed from Brett Sutter, finding the spot over Enroth’s left pad from the slot.

Turning point
The third period featured a complete momentum shift in favor of the visitors. The Reign were outshot 14-6 and Stothers said this in his postgame interview: “I’m not even sure we generated anything in the third period. So, that in itself is, either you’re sitting on it and protecting a lead or we ran out of gas. And maybe we did.” The end result was the Gulls pulling Enroth and scoring just seconds later to force overtime. Despite the Reign being awarded a late power play in the third they couldn’t convert as the advantage bled over into OT.

Stat fact
–3:57 – The span in which the Reign gave up the tying goal and the overtime winner.

Lineups and injuries
Forward Paul Bissonnette briefly returned to the lineup and Stothers revealed afterwards that he tweaked his same lower-body injury in his first shift of the game when he got tangled up against the boards with Kevin Roy and did not return. … Forward Teddy Purcell missed his first game with the Reign as he was injured in practice a day prior. Stothers said there was zero possibility he plays Saturday night.

This and that off-ice
The Reign’s special Pink in the Rink jerseys were sold in a silent auction to a sellout crowd of 9,491.

Next up
This post All-Star break home-and-home wraps up in San Diego on Saturday night at 7 p.m.