January 23: Bus texts with Stothers

After every Reign road game I’ll try to catch up with head coach Mike Stothers to get some texts and his assessment of the game. Here’s what he had to say after Saturday’s 2-1 win over San Jose as his team completed a home-and-home sweep.

Reign 2, Barracuda 1
The Reign welcomed Kurtis MacDermid back from his suspension and the rookie scored a goal in Ontario’s victory at SAP Center. Sean Backman scored his 10th goal of the season and was credited with the game-winner off a feed from Michael Mersch. Nic Dowd extended his point streak to six games with assists on both goals and Peter Budaj made 18 saves for his 22nd win. Defenseman Derek Forbort was a surprise scratch for the first time since being sent by the Kings back to Ontario.

BUS TEXTS WITH STOTHERS
ORI: Reasoning behind Forbort scratch?
Stothers: Injury related [ORI: Upper/lower, can you say?] Lower body
ORI: What did you think of MacDermid’s game in his return?
Stothers: He was pretty good. Kept things simple and made some good plays. A little rust from lack of game play but that was to be expected.
ORI: Overall thoughts on the game and weekend?
Stothers: Good weekend points-wise but I do not think we played a complete 60-minute game in any of them. The wain can be deceiving. We still need to be better and be more consistent. Elevate our starts and clean up on our execution. Maybe I am raising the bar too high, but I see a group with great potential. We need to raise our expectations and push each other to a higher level of compete.