ONTARIO, Calif. – The Ontario Reign, defending Pacific Division Champions and proud affiliate of the NHL’s 2012 Los Angeles Kings suffered their first loss of the season before a sellout crowd of 9,616 on Saturday night. The Reign were scoreless against the Thunder in their second meeting.

Stockton’s Matt Reber got an early goal in the first period as he, along with Jesse Fratkin, skated the puck into the Ontario end. Fratkin sent a quick pass to Reber right in front of Ontario’s JF Berube and the Stockton rookie slipped it past the goaltender’s blocker side. There were no other tallies for the remainder of the frame.

Once the second period began, the rivalry between these two clubs was ignited. Stockton had three power play opportunities, including a two-man advantage, but couldn’t convert them.

Ontario couldn’t seem to get their offense working and Stockton had two more tallies added in the final period. Gabriel Levesque got Stockton’s third goal of the night on the Thunder power play. He managed to pop it up and over Berube’s pads through traffic. Reber scored the final mark of the game after skating into the Reign end in a one-on-one and netted a top-shelf wrist shot.

Berube took the loss, stopping 23 of 27 Stockton shots. Rookie Tyler Bunz stopped all of the Reign’s 17 shots.

Three Stars:

1. STK – Matt Reber

2. STK – Tyler Bunz

3. ONT – Colton Yellow Horn

Click here for the box score.

Reign Drops:

The Reign's next match up is against the San Francisco Bulls at Citizens Business Bank Arena on Wednesday, Oct. 17. This is the first State Farm 2-for-1 Wednesday where fans can stop by any participating State Farm agent and pick up their Ontario Reign vouchers good for any Wednesday night.

- ontarioreign.com -