By Kahlil Najar

SAN FRANCISCO – The San Francisco Bulls (8-13-2-1) got on the board early but then surrendered four unanswered goals and lost to the first place Ontario Reign (16-3-1-3), 4-1. Dale Mitchell had the only goal for the Bulls in the first period and Tyler Beskorowany stopped 44 of 48 shots in the loss and is now at an even .500 record for the year. The Bulls are now 1-3-1-0 on the year against Reign and are 0-10 when scoring one goal or less.

Ontario hardly ran away with this game as they received 8 penalties in the game and gave the Bulls all the opportunities they needed to come back but were unsuccessful in each power play. The Bulls are ranked second to last on the power play at home in the league.

“I just thought the game was terrible from the drop of the puck. There was no flow because of all the penalties. We didn’t capitalize on our opportunities, it took a negative spin on us,” said head coach Pat Curcio.

Excluding the horrid power play for the Bulls, the play of goalie Beskorwany had to be a highlight for the Bulls. Bekso stopped 18 shots in the first period and turned away 44 shots in total.

“Our defense was terrible tonight and their passing was less than average. We weren’t sharp at all. I can’t say anyone was good tonight other than Besko. He made a lot of saves for us tonight and kept us in the game,” continued Curcio.

Dale Mitchell continued his great game play as he put the Bulls on the board first 5:23 into the first period as he tossed a puck in front of the goal that scooted past everyone and hit the boards behind the net and bounced all the way back onto his stick and he was able to beat the Reign’s Redmann and give the Bulls a 1-0 lead. Adrian Foster and Dean Ouellet received assists on the goal. The Reign kept Besko on his heels in the first as he faced 18 shots and turned them all away. The Bulls were only able to get 9 in on Redmann.

The second period started rough and turned out to the toughest period in the contest.  The Bulls gave up three unanswered goals and weren’t able to capitalize on six penalties to the Reign. A little over five minutes into the period and on a penalty kill, Ontario’s Eric Springer grabbed the puck at mid-ice and went storming in and took a shot that Beskso was able to stop but the rebound came out right in front to Towns who scored his third goal of the season and tied the game at one a piece. Six minutes later, on their second power play of the game (a boarding and fighting call on Dylan King) the Reign’s Jake Newton took a shot from the top of the face-off circle that was turned away by Besko but Brett Beebe was able to gather the rebound and hit the back of the net and give the Reign a 2-1 lead.

With under five minutes left in the second, Dean Ouellet and Scott Langdon received back-to-back penalties and gave the Reign their third power play of the night and on the 5-on-3 Mario Lamoureux (who wins for name closest to Mario Lemieux) scored on another rebound given up by Besko and gave the Reign a 3-1 lead after two.

On a nice fake that shook a Bulls defender off of him, the Reigns Cody Sol scored his first goal of the season and sealed the Ontario victory 4-1.

Curcio concluded, “We came off a high last weekend and had a couple days off and we didn’t come back sharp.”

The Bulls hope to turn it around tomorrow against the fifth place Stockton Thunder at 7:30pm.