1/17 REIGN FINAL – Reign 1, Canucks 2 – Sturm, Ingham

In a game that remained scoreless until early in the third period, the Abbotsford Canucks (20-12-2-1) got enough offense in a 90 second span that featured two goals to defeat the Ontario Reign (21-12-3-1) Wednesday night by a score of 2-1 at the Abbotsford Centre.

Samuel Helenius netted the lone Reign goal of the contest during an Abbotsford power play in the third, while goaltender Jacob Ingham held the Canucks off the board for most of the night and finished with 29 saves in a losing effort.

BOX SCORE

The teams skated through a scoreless first period which featured nine shots by Ontario and eight from Abbotsford.

While the action heated up in the second, neither club was able to break through the opposing netminder. The Canucks had multiple open looks at Ontario’s net that were saved by Ingham, and another two opportunities that were blocked at the last second by defenders Steven Santini and Cody Haiskanen.

Although the game was still scoreless to begin the third, the offenses wasted no time getting on the board. Kim Nousiainen was called for interference 43 seconds into the final frame, giving Abbotsford its first power play of the night.

The Canucks worked the puck to Chase Wouters on the back door, who missed an open net tap-in. Helenius picked up the rebound for Ontario and took the puck coast-to-coast before finishing with a wrist shot up high to open the scoring unassisted and make it 1-0 at 1:02 of the third.

Later during the same Nousiainen interference penalty, the Canucks came back to even the game on a play near the net at 1:54 that saw a feed by Linus Karlsson glance off Haiskanen and over Ingham into the goal to tie the game at 1-1.

At 2:57, Ryan Francis thought he scored on a quick shot off a faceoff, but the play was deemed no-goal on the ice and the call was later confirmed via video review.

18 seconds later, Ontario allowed a 2-on-1 rush the other way that saw Max Sasson convert to give Abbotsford its first lead of the two-game series at 2-1.

The Reign spent the rest of the game trying to get even, but failed to score a second goal on Canucks’ netminder Nikita Tolopilo, who earned the win with 30 saves in the contest.

While Ontario did get Helenius’ goal shorthanded, they were held to an 0-for-3 result on the power play and killed one of two Abbotsford advantages.

Marco Sturm
On tonight’s game and result
I thought we were better than them, but unfortunately two mistakes cost us the hockey game. Sometimes that’s how it goes. We’ve been lucky in the past too. Today was much better and we didn’t get a win, but it was nice to see [the effort], especially after the back-to-back game. The guys played hard overall and we wanted to finish the road trip on the right note. It was okay but it still could have been better. We pretty much started the same way we did yesterday. Everyone was involved. Ingham was good in net. I liked our flow. I liked how the guys worked and they just deserved more today.

On Samuel Helenius’ line
That was the tough part about that line because I thought they played really well. The one goal we thought we had was disallowed, and then all of a sudden, they made a mistake and it cost us the game. That’s unfortunate, but that’s something they have to get better at too. It’s a tie game and I trust them, and they’ve got to get the job done too. It was an unfortunate night for them because they played well and we just didn’t finish.

On his overall thoughts on the road trip
Abbotsford is one of the better teams in the league with Calgary. Those are tough games, and to go in there and into their buildings and steal points from them, I give my guys credit. They battled hard and were good defensively. Sometimes we got lucky. I think our goaltending was solid, and special teams was big. Maybe not today, but in those four games, our special teams made a big impact.

 

Jacob Ingham

 

Ontario will travel home to Southern California on Thursday and begin preparing for two home games this weekend in the Inland Empire, beginning Saturday night against the Coachella Valley Firebirds at 6 p.m.