Ontario, California. — Martin Chromiak’s winning penalty kick gave the Ontario Reign their sixth straight victory, beating the Henderson Silver Knights 4-3 in overtime on Friday night at Toyota Arena.
“It was a tough game,” Andre Lee said in his postgame interview. “Despite that, we stuck to a structure and never gave up. I’m glad we got the win.”
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Ontario goaltender Pheonix Copley made 33 saves on 30 shots and did not allow a goal in overtime.
“We have a great team,” Lee said. “We know what to expect from each other every night and I felt like you could see that today. We were physical, we were shooting, we were skating fast. And then (Copley) got back in there and he saved us a lot, so a lot of credit goes to him and it kept us in the game.”
Jakub Brabenec scored the first and only goal in the opening period, with assists from Mitch McClain and Joe Fleming, to advance the Silver Knights.
Jared Wright was recalled to the Los Angeles Kings again Thursday afternoon.
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Earlier today, Ontario called up two forwards, Kenta Isogai and Keaton Mastrodonato, from the ECHL’s Greenville Swamp Rabbits, and Isogai made sure to get his name known.
Isogai scored the game-tying goal with 14:40 left in the second period, assisted by Angus Booth and Kirill Kirsanov.
This is Isogai’s second goal for the Reign this season.
Kromiak scored for his 19th time this season, firing a lone shot past Henderson goalie Carl Lindbom to give Ontario its first lead of the night.
Matyas Sapovaliv tied the game again with a power-play goal 30 seconds into the final period.
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Lee scored his 23rd goal of the season with assists from Angus Booth and Cole Gutmann to give the Reign the lead before Henderson added an attacker in the final minutes of the game.
And that’s exactly how the Silver Knights wanted it, as Raphael Lavoie tied the score at 18-12 in the third quarter and sent the game into overtime.
Copley’s wonderful goal continued into overtime, and Kromiak’s penalty kick sent everyone home with a smile.
Ontario went 0-for-1 on the power play and Henderson went 1-for-4.
Next:
Ontario Reign (37-16-1-1; 76 points; No. 1) vs. Henderson Silver Knights (24-18-6-4; 58; No. 7) Sunday at 3 p.m. at Lee’s Family Forum in Henderson, Nevada.