Preview: Gulls, Reign Reignite Rivalry Tonight
Feb 10, 2021The rivalry is back on.
The San Diego Gulls host the Ontario Reign tonight at FivePoint Arena (7 p.m. - Radio: iHeartRadio; Stream: AHLTV). Tonight marks the first time since Feb. 1, 2020 that San Diego continues its storied Southern California rivalry against Ontario in a regular-season contest.
Tonight’s matchup marks the first of a 10-game season series promising to impress, as both teams have no love lost and sport some of the best young talent in the league. San Diego posted a 4-3-2-0 record against Ontario during the 2019-20 season and earned standings points in four of the five contests on home ice (2-1-2-0). The Gulls carry a four-game point streak vs. Ontario (4-1-2-0) into tonight's game, and earned points in six of the past seven games against their Southern California rival.
San Diego owns a 33-19-3-2 all-time record against Ontario, including a 16-10-3-0 mark at home. Sam Carrick paced San Diego in assists and co-led in scoring vs. Ontario last season (2-7=9). Antoine Morand recorded his first point (assist) and goal in back-to-back games against Ontario, Oct. 25-26, 2019.
The two teams met in an exhibition contest on Jan. 29 at Honda Center, where the Gulls came back from a two-goal deficit late in the third period to beat the Reign, 4-3, in overtime. Rookie forward Trevor Zegras recorded two assists for one of his three multi-assist performances in four exhibition games, and he hasn’t slowed down since.
On Monday, the league announced it selected Zegras as the CCM/AHL Player of the Week for the period ending February 7, 2021. The rookie sensation began his professional career by recording two goals and three assists (2-3=5) in two weekend contests against Bakersfield. The forward enters today co-leading the AHL in points and assists, and ranks tied for fourth in goals.
Zegras isn’t the only one with success during the opening weekend sweep. Chase De Leo earned 2-2=4 points, including a game-winning goal in the season-opening game on Feb. 5, a career-best start to a season. The La Mirada, CA native enters today’s contest co-leading the AHL in plus/minus (+5) and shots (12).
Carrick added a goal of his own on Saturday, Feb. 6 and co-leads the AHL with De Leo with a +5 rating.
“It’s huge and we all know it as that group of young guys,” said Zegras on the leadership of his two linemates, Carrick and De Leo. “I definitely don’t think I’d be able to have the weekend I had without those guys. All the support and all of the little things. Sammy is also not afraid to let me know how it is which is great. I really appreciate being on a line with him and actually sitting next to him and Chase in the locker room. It’s just the little things that they’ll hint at me to keep me on track.”
Fellow rookie Jamie Drysdale scored his first professional goal in the first period on Saturday, Feb. 6 to become the youngest player in Gulls history to score his first career AHL goal (18 years, 9 months, 28 days). Drysdale also added an assist to record his first professional multi-point effort (1-1=2).
Rookie goaltender Lukas Dostal impressed the coaching staff with his first two starts, stopping 69 of 73 shots for consecutive victories. Dostal recorded back-to-back wins to start his AHL career. He became just the third Gulls netminder to win each of his first two starts with the club, joining John Gibson (Oct. 10-16, 2015) and Anton Khudobin (Dec. 18-19, 2015).
“Not just the youth, but the quality of those young guys,” said assistant coach Sylvain Lefebvre following Saturday’s 4-3 win over the Condors. “They’re skilled and their hockey sense is through the roof. Right now, Jamie (Drysdale) is playing really well the veteran Keegan Lowe. Then you have (Trevor) Zegras who’s playing with Sam Carrick and Chase De Leo, and they’re doing really well. They bring our offense. There are other guys like (Lukas) Dostal – you can’t forget about him because he’s the real deal. You saw it in the two games, especially tonight, getting [43] shots and holding the fort there at the end when Bakersfield was pressing hard.”
The start of the 2020-21 season is a total reversal from Gulls head coach Kevin Dineen’s first season with the club. Last year, San Diego dropped its first six contests of the season, and had to battle back into playoff position. This year, a hot start is exactly what the coaching staff was hoping for.
“Obviously, it’s a point that we mentioned a couple times before we started the season,” added Lefebvre following Saturday’s 4-3 win over the Condors. “We did not want to start like last year. When you’re down six (games), it’s hard to fight back and get back in the thick of things. I really liked our start this year and not just last night, but tonight. Some nights, you need really good goaltending, and we got that on both nights.”
Following tonight’s game, the Gulls will continue their season-opening six-game homestand with a two-game weekend set against the Colorado Eagles on Friday, Feb. 12 (7 p.m.) and Sunday, Feb. 14 (7 p.m.) at FivePoint Arena.