Scheifele plays overtime hero, leads Jets' charge for positive momentum

SUNRISE, Fla. - Hours before puck drop, Mark Scheifele stood in the hallway and spoke about the land of opportunity.

No, the Winnipeg Jets centre wasn’t ignoring the fact his team had dropped seven of the previous eight games and had only two wins in the past 11, he was well aware of those facts.

But Scheifele knows that lamenting over lost points won’t help do anything to get things turned around.

“The biggest thing is you can’t look at right now as doomsday, you have to look at it as motivation or extra determination,” said Scheifele, who would end up playing the role of overtime hero in Saturday’s 5-4 victory over the Florida Panthers. “We’re still in a playoff spot and we’ve still got lots of games left. In the tough stretches, you’ve just got to stick together. Look at this as extra fun. We’ve got lots of hockey left to prove what our team can do.”

That Scheifele dropped a “stick together” reference that longtime linemate Blake Wheeler used just one day earlier to describe the situation probably wasn’t an accident either, it simply reinforces one of the themes these Jets are trying to lean into as things have become a little more difficult than need be in the Western Conference playoff race.

Saturday’s game against the Panthers was a prime example.

In many ways, the Jets turned the tables on the previous two games, when they played well but ran into a hot goalie and ended up losing both contests (though one of them went to overtime and resulted in a single point).

“A lot of our problems tonight were self-inflicted with puck management. That really hurt us. We spent some unnecessary time in our zone,” said Bowness. “The good news is we scored the five goals, which was huge. The power play looked good. The puck went in the net for us. We probably played better the last two games and lost. But we’ll take any win we can get it, any way we can get it. It was scrambly out there for both teams. It was.”

Scheifele was in the middle of things once again for the Jets, scoring a pair of goals to give him a team-leading 38.

He was also praised for his defensive play, specifically for winning a battle in the defensive zone in the latter stages of the contest.

“I’m not a big looker at how many (goals) I have. I know when my game is looking good,” said Scheifele. “When I’m happy with my game and I’m not happy with my game. Ever since the bye week, I’ve been feeling good about my game and I want to keep that going and I want to continue to work. That hard work always prevails in the end.”

With Pierre-Luc Dubois out of the lineup with an upper-body injury he sustained after a collision with Sharks defenceman Mario Ferraro, the Jets need Scheifele to be a game-breaker and in this game, he was.

Scheifele was also able to benefit from a video review as he was originally assessed a major penalty for boarding after an awkward collision with Panthers defenceman Gustav Forsling in the third period.

The call was overturned and Scheifele didn’t even receive a penalty.

In the first period, Jets left-winger Kyle Connor had a slashing major reduced to a minor.

“A very good thing. I don't quite understand the process, how it happens, but (I'm) obviously glad that it's in place, they were able to look at it, and change them,” said Scheifele, who went on to describe the play in question with Forsling that sparked a melee. “We were just kind of shoulder and shoulder and he tried to make a move at the last second and make a play for the puck and he kind of threw himself into the boards. Very glad they had that review and I didn't get a penalty there.”

The Jets were opportunistic and built a pair of two-goal leads (3-1 and 4-2), only to watch the Panthers rally by scoring twice in the third period - and three times on the power play - to get the game to extra time.

“We didn't love the goals we gave up,” said Jets defenceman Dylan DeMelo. “We take great pride in our penalty kill and we got torched tonight, no doubt about it. Back to the drawing board for our PK. We have confidence in it. It's won us a lot of games this year and I'm sure we will get it rectified.”

To make matters worse, the Jets lost defenceman Josh Morrissey and centre Adam Lowry to lower-body injuries.

Morrissey left the game with just over three minutes to go in the second period and while he came out for the third period, he played only one shift before departing for good, leaving the Jets to battle with just five blue-liners for roughly a full period.

As for Lowry, he took his final shift with just over five minutes to play in regulation time.

When he spoke to reporters during his post-game address, Jets head coach Rick Bowness was unsure of the severity of the injuries to both players, though he said both were “very doubtful” for Sunday’s game against the Tampa Bay Lightning.

That likely opens the door for Dylan Samberg and/or Kyle Capobianco to return on defence and either Sam Gagner or Karson Kuhlman to slot in up front.

Jets goalie Connor Hellebuyck was busy in this one and finished with 44 saves to record the victory in what was his 50th start of the campaign.

Despite a high volume of shots, don’t be surprised to see the Jets lean on Hellebuyck in Sunday’s game against the Tampa Bay Lightning.

The Lightning will be going with Andrei Vasilevskiy after going with backup Brian Elliott against the Chicago Blackhawks on Saturday.

Given how difficult the upcoming schedule is for the Jets, securing the bonus point was incredibly important.

Can the Jets, who improved to 37-26-3, turn this victory into something they can rally around?

“It's funny, right? It's quite obvious they took it to us there for large stretches and we found a way to win,” said DeMelo. “The last two games, we were on the other end of that. I think we just did a good job of finding a way to win.”

At this time of the season, when a team is trying to turn the race into chasing down the teams in front of them rather than leaving the door open to those behind them, that’s all that really matters.