Ontario Reign forward Tyler Madden (#10) celebrates a goal he scored in the first period with his teammates along the bench against the San Jose Barracuda at Tech CU Arena on Wednesday FEB 19, 2025. (San Jose Barracuda)

by Marko Ukalovic

SAN JOSE — The Ontario Reign jumped out to a huge lead with scored three power play goals and then held on to escape with a 6-4 victory over the San Jose Barracuda on Wednesday evening at Tech CU Arena.

San Jose has lost four of its last five games. Ontario has won four games in a row and are on an eight-game points steak.

Ontario (30-14-2-1-63 points) drew first blood early in the first period with a power play goal. Reilly Walsh connected with Martin Chromiak along the left wing and Chromiak beat Cuda goalie Yaroslav Askarov with a one-timer for his 10th goal of the season at the 3:12 mark. Askarov was called for delay of game as he played the puck outside the restricted zone.

San Jose’s (25-18-2-3-55 points) giftwrapped a present to Ontario thanks to bad read inside their own zone. Askarov’s attempted pass to Luca Cagnoni deflected off the leg of Cagnoni into the middle of the ice. Aatu Jamsen was at the right place at the right time as he buried the puck into an empty net for his fourth goal of the season at the 8:05 mark to double Ontario’s lead.

The Barracuda’s disastrous start became much worse as the Reign scored its second straight power play goal less than two minutes later. Jack Studnicka won a battle along the left boards. He sent a rink wide pass over to an uncontested Tyler Madden, who beat Askarov with a wrist shot to the glove side for his eighth goal of the season at the 9:50 mark.

Askarov left the game at the 11:08 mark with an apparent lower body injury and was replaced by backup Gabrielle Carriere. Askarov (10-8-1-3) gave up three goals on 14 shots during his shortest outing of the season.

Ontario dominated the opening frame outshooting San Jose 20-9 and had the ice tilted in their favor for the majority of the period. Reign goalie Phoenix Copley wasn’t tested much stopping all nine shots he faced.

The Reign opened the second period with its fourth unanswered goal and third on the man advantage. Lucas Vanroboys was called for an Unsportsmanlike penalty at the end of the first period when he shot the puck on net after time had expired. That gave Ontario 55 seconds of five-on-three play to start the period. Jamsen recorded his second goal of the game when he cleaned up a rebound off of a Charles Hudon shot from the point for his fifth goal of the season at the :40 mark.

San Jose finally stopped the bleeding near the halfway mark of the middle frame with a power play goal. Cagnoni stole the puck off of Angus Booth from behind the goal line and quickly centered a backhand pass out to Andrew Poturalski. The ‘Cuda captain got Copley to go down before roofing a backhander for his team leading 20th goal of the season at the 9:50 mark.

Ontario regained its four-goal lead seconds after its fifth power play expired. Samuel Helenius led an odd man rush up the ice and found Taylor Ward in front of the crease and Ward beat Carriere with a backhander for his ninth goal of the season at the 13:33 mark.

Jeff Malott scored his 17th goal of the season with 50 seconds left in the period when he redirected a shot from the point by Luke Rowe past Carriere to give Ontario its biggest lead of the game. Hudon recorded his fourth helper of the contest with the secondary assist on the play.

“We talked about it before the game, that it was going to come down to one-on-one battles at the net front and loose pucks. And we just lost too many. I was expecting a better effort. We gotta take a look at it. We gotta pull what we can from it and we gotta improve because we got these guys again on Saturday,” Cuda head coach John McCarthy said.

Danil Gushchin gave the Cuda its second goal of the contest early in the third period. Filip Bystedt led a counterattack up the ice and found Pavol Regenda that led to an odd man rush with Danil Gushchin. Regenda’s backhand pass skipped and bounced over to Gushchin who beat Copley with a quick wrist shot for his 14th goal of the season at the 6:23 mark.

San Jose scored its second power play goal just past the halfway mark of the final frame. Joey Keane received a favorable bounce off of the left boards. Keane found Tristen Robins all alone in front of the net and Robins tapped home the puck past Copley for his seventh of the season at the 10:56 mark.

The Barracuda scored its third unanswered goal in the period as well as its third power play goal thanks to an outstanding coast-to-coast play from Cagnoni. After receiving the puck from Carriere from behind own net, Cagnoni skated the full length of the ice, maneuvering past Booth, before beating Copley with a backhander past the five-hole for his 13th goal of the season and ninth on the power play at the 13:31 mark.

“(I) kind of made a move at our blueline, thought I had a chance to get some things going. We were still down, obviously, so it was just get some momentum even if it didn’t go in. I don’t know I just kind of put it through his stick, put it (past) the five-hole. (It was) kind of an instinct play,” Cagnoni said.

San Jose had a six-on-four power play opportunity when Helenius went to the sin bin for high sticking and McCarthy pulled Carriere for an extra attacker with 3:23 remaining in the game. However, Copley and the Reign penalty kill settled down the ship and never allowed the Barracuda to get any closer to pulling off a dramatic comeback.

Copley (15-7-0-2) finished the game making 32 saves on 36 shots to record his 15th victory of the season. Carriere made 18 saves on 21 shots in mop-up duty.

GAME NOTES: San Jose finished 3-for-6 on the power play. Ontario went 3-for-6.

The Three Stars of the Game: 1) Hudon (0G, 4A) 2) Jamsen (2G,OA) 3) Cagnoni (1G,1A) .

UP NEXT: San Jose and Ontario conclude their home-and-home series on Saturday at 6:00pm at Toyota Arena.