Recap: Matt Coronato’s first pro fight fires up Wranglers in 3-1 win over Reign

Later in the period, Matt Coronato dropped the gloves at 12:38. He fought Brandt Clarke and held himself very well. What caused this fight was Coronato playing the screen in front of the net and checked Clarke from behind. Clarke had a problem with that and retaliated with a check of his own, resulting in the fight between these two. This was the first professional fight for both of these players. 

Later in the period, the Reign generated some offence for themselves and answered back before the end of the second. Taylor Ward received a clearing pass and could not be caught on the rush. He took a shot from the faceoff dot and beat Dustin Wolf off the far post.

That completed the action in the second period and by the end of 40 minutes, Calgary and Ontario were evened up 1-1. Shots through the second period were 10-8 in favour of Calgary. The Wranglers pulled ahead in the third, but that wouldn’t take place until about the last quarter of the period. 

The opening portion of the third was played fairly tight. Calgary wouldn’t score again until 14:52 into the period. Kuznetsov backhanded a rebound and scored for the second night in a row. This put Kuznetsov on an active three-game point streak and his goal was assisted by Ben Jones and Adam Klapka.

The Reign let a couple of minutes pass then pulled Erik Portillo at 17:02 to try and even up the game one again. 14 seconds after Portillo went to the bench, Ben Jones scored on the empty net. Jakob Pelletier assisted on this insurance goal. Portillo stayed in net for about 90 seconds and went back to the bench once again at 18:37. Ontario took a penalty with 33 seconds to go in regulation and that pretty much closed the game with their hopes of coming back further dwindling.

The Wranglers finished this game with a 3-1 win and narrowly out-shot their opponents 30-27. Two Calgary skaters earned a spot on the three stars with Yan Kuznetsov picking up the first star and Adam Klapka picking up the second. 

Scoring stat summary 

Ben Jones – 1G, 1A

Yan Kuznetsov – 1G

Matt Coronato – 1A

Adam Klapka – 2A

Jakob Pelletier – 1G, 1A

Next up 

There are a few Wranglers headed to the All-Star game on Feb. 4 & 5. Head coach Trent Cull, Matt Coronato and Dustin Wolf are the team’s representatives this year. This is the second year in a row a Wranglers coach has been named Coach of the Pacific Division All-Stars and the second year in a row, Dustin Wolf is representing his team. 

Beyond that, the Wranglers will not play their next game until Friday, Feb. 9. They’ll play an afternoon game back at home against the San Diego Gulls. The puck drop is set for 1:00 p.m. MT.