WINNIPEG — One free goal.
In the razor-thin margin that the new National Hockey League presents, that is all it takes to lose. One goal earned with less than a valiant effort, one relatively routine save not made in a 3-2 game then ends 4-2 on an empty-netter by the Minnesota Wild.
“Against the best team in our conference, I think we were better than they were over the course of the game,” declared Winnipeg Jets head coach Paul Maurice, abandoned all season long by his men in masks. “I know we’re a hell of a lot better than we’ve been in a long time.”
In a game that required perfection, the Jets nearly found it Tuesday. They battled the league’s No. 2 team to a standstill, forcing Wild goalie Devan Dubnyk to face 40 shots for only the second time all season long.
Winnipeg got a couple of pucks in behind Dubnyk that somehow failed to cross the goal line, but alas, and with better luck could have prevailed. A 3-0 deficit built on two good goals and one shabby one was too much, however.
Goalie Ondrej Pavelec left the game injured after the third goal, and was not available post-game to speak to his health. He was replaced by a flawless Connor Hellebuyck, who has had struggles of his own this season.
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This loss tasted like so many this season, salted with the fact their goalie, recently reclaimed from the Manitoba Moose of the American Hockey League, let one in that has to be stopped.
Everyone in that dressing room knows it, but in hockey culture no one is about to throw a teammate “under the bus.”
“Regardless of the score, I thought we controlled a good portion of the play,” said Blake Wheeler, who blew a chance in the low slot late in the game that could have tied the score. “They have really good goaltending, and they skate really well.”
“We did outplay them for a long time,” echoed Danish winger Nikolaj Ehlers. “But, they have some good goaltending. They’re a great team. That’s why they are where they are right now.”
Maybe that’s the code. “They got great goaltending.” Because you know the players know. They have to know.
It presents a problem on so many fronts, the most obvious of which is the scoreboard. OK, so Nino Niederreiter’s game-opening goal was a laser wrist shot through four different legs that buzzed top shelf over Pavelec’s glove hand.
Nice goal.
But when Jason Pominville came down the right side in the final minutes of the first, it didn’t even flag as a scoring chance. His shot went off the inside of Pavelec’s right arm, raised to deflect the puck into the corner or over the glass, and ended up in the Jets’ net with 41 seconds left in the first period.
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“We did outplay them for a long time but they have some good goaltending. They’re a great team. That’s why they are where they are right now.”
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It is simply too difficult to score goals in today’s game to surrender one so frivolously. It has happened to the Jets all season long, a level of goaltending that can present a crutch to the rest of the lineup.
How can we win with goaltending like this? What difference does it make how well we play when we give up one of those every night? What’s the point if we can’t get a save?
You won’t hear any of those excuses on the morning sports shows. You won’t hear it on Jets premises, because it’s deemed an excuse.
In fact, however, it’s not an excuse for losing. It’s a reason.
“That’s as good as we’ve played defensively in an awful long time,” Maurice praised. “We had a combined total of 33 shots in the first two games we played against this team. We put up 40 (tonight).
“The attitude was right, the work ethic was right. The attention to detail was as good as it’s been in a long time. It’s at least something to sell, that we can generate some offence and play good defence at the same time.”
Maurice can’t blame his team for not scoring four goals a night to win, the same way he can’t blame them for keeping Pominville on the outside on his goal.
“Oh, you’re going to be in a bad mood tomorrow. It won’t be a gentler meeting,” Maurice promised. “You have to hold them to the fact that winning is everything in pro sports. But, you have to have an assessment of your game that’s honest.
“That’s as good as we’ve played in a while against a pretty good team.”
Now six points out of the playoffs with two teams to pass, the Jets can’t play much better than this. And they lost because the team with the second-best goalie almost always loses.
It’s not an excuse. It’s a reason.
