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Reign Recap: Notes, Quotes, and Video from Game 4 vs Roadrunners

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Friday night in El Segundo, the Ontario Reign faced their third opponent over the first four games of the young season, and came away empty handed yet again.

Sure, there were positives — like Akil Thomas and Aidan Dudas notching their first AHL goals — however, another blunder by goaltender Matt Villalta may have been the difference in a game that ended 5-4.

With things tied up 1-1 after 20 minutes, things became wild in the second frame. Tucson built a 4-1 lead in about eight minutes, capped by a shorthanded goal. Ontario managed to claw their way back into it and get the score to 4-3 heading into second intermission. When Thomas scored a goal off a beautiful pass from Quinton Byfield to tie the game with about 10 minutes remaining in regulation, the Reign seemed to be building momentum at the right time, having scored three unanswered goals, those vibes were short-lived, as Tucson jumped ahead 5-4 less than a minute later. That was enough to claim the victory.

Ontario’s line combos and D pairs can be found here.

Coach John Wroblewski shared the following thoughts:

On out-shooting every opponent this season, yet still not being rewarded with wins

We have a tremendous young group of players and they’re learning the nuances of shift-to-shift consistency, but they’ve shown when they bring it — and it can’t just be individually, and it can’t be a few shifts here and a few shifts there, it has to be every shift and collective effort — when we do that, they can go out and and produce a lot of scoring chances. What we have to do is just keep bolstering the good things that they’re doing and then, unfortunately for the team right now — or fortunately, we get to learn from our mistakes. We had a few self-inflicted wounds tonight. When you gift a team three goals, which we basically did with a couple failed clears on the PK, and then of course the the power play turnover. Those will be lessons that these guys learn and if they haven’t yet in their young careers, they’re learning them now.

On the importance of the young guys building chemistry with one another

That’s not really an issue. I think the guys see a lot of plays developing. For instance, our line rush scheme, right before the fifth goal, we score and then we break out of our end and we go in and Turcotte and Kaliyev run a high-end exchange, where Turc leaves it for Arty and then he fills the far lane and Arty’s backhand pass goes through the the royal road to the other side and just barely misses that connection. So they’re seeing the lanes that are opening up and they’re applying the concepts that high-end players are ingrained with. Now, it’s just about completing that shift. Yeah, we need the pinch on the wall, but ultimately we need those guys to learn that they relaxed a little bit on the back-check and left our d-man in a really tough spot to to take on that that rush. There are all these lessons and you’d love to be able to learn them while still getting the team result, but it ultimately doesn’t really work out that way. I think that we can use some of these these situations, and our results, as fuel to the fire that when we bring it, we’re really difficult to handle. When we let off the gas or if we don’t grab a shift, and I’m convinced that every shift that these guys play there’s one small mistake that kind of sets the the dominoes in the wrong direction. When our guys start to really understand those mistakes, or their positioning, and apply it, I’m really excited for the future. And I’m gonna say that until the very end, even if we keep having the end result. I still think that these guys are building and learning lessons, no matter what the what the final score is.

On any similarities from three different opponents in four games

I actually think it’s really important for the young guys to kind of see the differences in what you’re going to encounter from different opponents. With Henderson, there are extremely heavy team and San Diego tends to lean back a little bit more in the neutral zone, towards a 1-2-2, but they’re equally aggressive on the forecheck. This Tucson club is sort of a blend of the of those two ideals, where they’re a little pass from the neutral zone, but then they’re going to start to jump you if you start dinking around with the puck. I don’t think we took advantage of some of the neutral zone opportunities that they provided us. That’ll be a focus for the tape. Learning that different teams play different ways, whether it’s a neutral zone structure, forecheck structure, or their pinching mechanism, the way they want to apply north-south pressure, it’s all fuel to the fire for these young players. I really do see marked improvement from almost every single one of them through these first four games.

On if Villalta is trying to do too much in net

I’ll leave that to Matt Millar and Matty Villalta to sort out. I’m not gonna try to place myself in the goaltender’s shoes at this point. I know Matty’s been around, up on the taxi squad a little bit, and missed the preseason, so this is really his first couple of games for us here. We have all the confidence in the world in Matty. I think that to ask him to be in mid-season form right now is a tall order. He’ll be back up to snuff very soon here.

On if he’s most concerned with before the next game, solving what’s going on with the defenseman or trying to get some of the forwards more in sync

That’s a great question. I think that all-in-all, everyone displayed a lot of really positive things tonight. I believe — after just taking a quick glance at the computer before this conversation — our scoring chances were tilted heavily in our favor, shots were in our favor, so it’s not as much about trying to fix anything. The scores will take care of themselves. I think it’s, individually there are a few mental lapses. Each guy has like one or two a game. That kind of leads to what looks like some multitude of mistakes. To me, these guys are so close to having everything click. That first period, we came out flying, there’s no other way around it. The last two games, our starts have been extremely fast. It’s kind of about finding that first [goal] a little bit earlier, having that same tenacity and that desire. Then, just stop that let down, not allow it to take place, having more killer instinct on the power play. There’s just so many things that these guys are learning and you can see the light bulb flashing every day – whether it’s one or two guys or an entire team, over one concept. Such as, before the San Diego game, we were just so deficient on the puck against Henderson on Monday afternoon, and we responded accordingly. We pushed the buttons and the guys really, really adjusted their game. We’re so young, not only in age but in the season. Yeah, we’d love to have a couple victories under our belt but that’s not how it always works. I’m confident if we keep pushing the right way here, and guys bring the right energy to the rink, the wins will take care of themselves.

The same two teams will rematch Sunday afternoon at 1pm.

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Lead photo courtesy of Ontario Reign

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  1. I agree with Coach Wrobo staying positive. Yes, it sucks starting the season 0-4, but what I’ve seen the last couple of games is the Reign controlling play for extended stretches, but they can’t quite finish — then one brain fart, and suddenly they’re down a goal. Talent and skill are clearly there, it really is consistency — which can and will be learned — that are the issue.