The Ontario Reign (11-3-0-1) were unable to overcome a third period deficit on the road and fell to the Abbotsford Canucks (5-6-2-1) Tuesday night by a final score of 3-2 at the Abbotsford Centre. The Canucks were led by their goaltender Michael DiPietro who made big saves in key moments to keep his team in the lead, while the Reign got goals from forwards Adam Johnson and Alex Turcotte in the defeat.
Ontario began the day in first place in the Pacific Division but dropped back into second after the loss with a points percentage at 0.767.
More from Reign Head Coach John Wroblewski below.
Ontario opened the scoring and secured an early lead just 1:03 into the game on Johnson’s first tally of the season. The play was started by Gabriel Vilardi who secured the puck near the left circle before sending a pass to his right for TJ Tynan. The center quickly found Johnson who was open in front of the net and made a quick move to the backhand for the strike.
Abbotsford evened the game at 1-1 later in the frame on a goal by Nic Petan off a rebound at 7:25. The Canucks took control of momentum in the game later in the frame and finished the period with a 12-4 shots-on-goal advantage.
Second period tallies by Phil Di Giuseppe on the breakaway at 12:11 and Sheldon Rempal on the power play at 15:49 put Abbotsford ahead 3-1.
The Canucks held that lead until just 6:47 remained in the third when Ontario got back within one on a shot by Jacob Moverare that found its way through traffic into the back of the net. Turcotte, who was in front of the net, was officially credited with the strike, while Jordan Spence earned a second assist on the tally.
Ontario had to kill two penalties in the final minutes which hampered its effort at tying the game, but the group still had a few late looks at the Abbotsford net which were shut down by DiPietro.
Reign goaltender Matt Villalta stopped 23 shots for Ontario, suffering just his second loss of the 2021-22 season. The Canucks had the lone power play goal of the contest, finishing 1-for-6 on the man-advantage while Ontario ended at 0-for-5. Abbotsford outshot the Reign overall, 26-23.
The two teams meet back up on Wednesday night for their sixth meeting of the season at the Abbotsford Centre at 7 p.m.
John Wroblewski
On the team’s power play in the game
The power play tonight was somewhat indicative of the way that they practiced and it’s not that the effort isn’t there, it’s just there wasn’t great execution in that department in practice and it sort of did carry over. It’s not unexpected, in that it’s our third game in 16 days. It’s not an excuse, but it’s a reality. You lose some of your game timing in those places so you try to replicate that in practice but it’s different when the other team is going against you. Just a different intensity level and one that our guys take a lot of pride in and hopefully adjust going into tomorrow night.
On how the atmosphere in Abbotsford affected the game
It was a great crowd. Came out for the national anthem and the crowd was into it and I thought that their team played energized, you could tell they had a little bite to their game after dropping two on the road in Tucson and getting swept there so we knew that was going to be part of their motivation factor. It’s a much better team than their record would indicate as well at this point, they’re very strong, the top three lines are explosive, their bottom forwards are good gritty players and their d-core is very mobile with decent size and offensive capabilities as well. I think it just came down to those key moments. We surrender what I thought was a stretch pass that we could’ve broken up and was fairly predictable coming through the middle and their guy made a great play and we just didn’t get a stick on it, we didn’t get to the middle of the ice to protect it properly. Then they score on the power play, we don’t, and then we don’t score on our breakaways, and we had a number of them. Kind of the story of the game there and overall a very entertaining contest and spirited and you hate losing so it’s tough coming up on the short end.
On the play of Gabriel Vilardi in his third game with Ontario this season
I saw a lot more of his range and his one-on-one play was strong tonight but it wasn’t risky one-on-one play, he was going through people while he was doing it so it wasn’t toe-drags, it was very determined efforts with his manufacturing and his ability to create for us. He also had a number of chances from the perimeter and strong bids to the net, not a lot in tight besides the breakaway if my memory serves right, but a lot of very strong chances from the B+ range of the house.
On a large portion of the team’s schedule being against Abbotsford so far
We got a little sprinkling of everyone in the conference so far and obviously more of a dousing from these guys but I can already tell you that I can write down the players on their line chart, I don’t even have to look at the names. I already know the numbers and who they are and that’s a rarity this early in the season. But I think there’s no surprise that we’re going to get everybody’s best right now with the way our record is and teams are working on solutions to try to beat us. We’ve got a very skilled team and we’ve got to make sure we own up to the grit department. Every time we get tested and get put in tough spots where teams are trying to intimidate us physically or anything like that, we’ve got to be ready to answer the bell and react appropriately and make sure we’re as gritty and determined if not more than the other team. But if we do even up, I love our squad and I love the way our guys can fill the net when we’re playing properly.
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