Glenn Gawdin’s second three-point effort in his last four games helped send the Ontario Reign (7-7-0-0) past the Henderson Silver Knights (4-10-0-0) by a score of 4-2 on Wednesday night at Lee’s Family Forum.
Gawdin had a goal and two assists to lead the way offensively for the Reign, while Samuel Fagemo added a goal and an assist in the victory and goaltender Pheonix Copley stopped 21 shots to earn the win in net for Ontario.
After a scoreless first in which the Reign outshot Henderson 7-5, Fagemo opened the scoring at 3:10 of the middle frame with a wrist shot off a 2-on-1 rush alongside Gawdin to make it 1-0 Ontario. The strike came one second after the team’s first power play of the game had ended and was Fagemo’s sixth tally of the 2024-25 year.
The lead was extended to 2-0 at 14:38 of the period when Kaleb Lawrence netted his second of the season, backhanding home a loose puck in front of the Henderson net. Assists on the play were credited to Taylor Ward and Shawn Element.
The Silver Knights got one back at 17:16 of the second when Brendan Brisson found the back of the net to cut the Ontario lead to 2-1.
But the Reign went back up by two before going into the locker room for the second intermission when Charles Hudon one-timed a pass from Gawdin into the goal for his fifth tally of the season. Hudon’s fifth of the season came 17 seconds into Ontario’s second man-advantage chance of the game at 19:23 of the period and had a second assist credited to Fagemo.
Neither club scored during the third until Henderson pulled goaltender Akira Schmid in the final moments and Gawdin found the empty-net for his seventh goal of the year at 18:18. A lone assist on the play was given to Jeff Malott.
Gawdin’s three-point night extended his scoring streak to four games, while the same is true for Malott, Hudon and Ward.
Jett Jones scored in the final minute of the contest for Henderson, who got back within two and pulled Schmid in exchange for an extra attacker once again, but were unable to get any closer before time expired to end the game.
Ontario held a 30-23 shots on goal edge in the game and finished 1-for-2 on the man-advantage, scoring the lone power play goal of the contest while holding the Silver Knights to an 0-for-1 mark.
Postgame reactions from Lawrence and head coach Marco Sturm are below –
Kaleb Lawrence
Marco Sturm
The Reign finish out their four-game stretch away from the Inland Empire on Saturday when they travel to San Diego to face the Gulls at Pechanga Arena, beginning at 6 p.m.
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