There’s been so much extreme stinking by a couple Canadian teams this NHL season that, if all you’re doing is having a plain ol’ disappointing season, your underwhelming results might fly under the radar. And for much of this year, it feels like the Winnipeg Jets have been locked into an altitude that has them cruising well below where they’d like to be, while still not crashing toward earth.
This past weekend, though, they showed some signs of pulling on that yoke and aiming a little higher.
On Friday night, on the road in Dallas, Mark Scheifele scored with 32 seconds remaining in the third period to tie a game the Jets eventually lost 4-3 in overtime. But at least they left Texas with a point. Twenty-four hours later in Tennessee, Winnipeg fell behind the Nashville Predators 2-0 in the first period. They also failed to score on a 2-on-0 from their own blueline early in the contest. But Scheifele again provided some life by halving the deficit less than 90 seconds after his team fell behind by two goals. When Mark Borowiecki took a third-period elbowing major, Winnipeg scored two PPGs to pull ahead 4-2, before captain Blake Wheeler sealed a 5-2 victory with an empty-netter.
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Wheeler, slowed by a knee injury this season, had a five-point night. Scheifele, dinged at various points this year for not living up to his own lofty standards, had three points. Adam Lowry dropped the gloves with Tanner Jeannot in the second frame, marking three straight contests with a knuckle-chucking session for Winnipeg. It’s safe to say there’s some spirit left in this squad.
The Jets — now coached by Lowry’s dad, Dave, after Paul Maurice said it was time to step away just before Christmas — have never scraped the bottom the way the Vancouver Canucks and Ottawa Senators did early in the year, and the way the Montreal Canadiens have, well, all season. But the expectations for this club — whose low point came just before the All-Star Weekend with a six-game winless streak — were to hang with the Central Division’s best and certainly, at the very least, punch a playoff ticket. That’s going to be a tall order now, as Winnipeg has the 11th-best points percentage in the West. Still, they hold games in hand on basically everyone in front of them and it’s not like anybody is banking on the likes of Dallas, Edmonton or Anaheim to shine the rest of the way, either.
Can a weekend earning three of four points on the road against divisional opponents propel them forward? If it doesn’t, any ambiguity about how we view their season will disappear and leave something more severe than just disappointment behind.
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Other Takeaways
• Speaking of Winnipeg, former Jet Patrik Laine is giving the team he’s been with for 13 months — the Columbus Blue Jackets — a lot to think about these days ahead of a big decision. Laine has existed on the fringe of trade deadline talk because Columbus is facing a crunch over what to do with the pending RFA. Laine, who’s six-year NHL career has been dotted with both white-hot and Klondike-cold streaks, is firing bullets right now. The big Finn used his signature shot to sink the Montreal Canadiens on Saturday afternoon, cracking his stick against the ice to call for a power-play feed from Zach Wereknski, then crushing the puck past Samuel Montembeault with eight seconds left in the game to give
Columbus a 2-1 win. The tally was Laine’s seventh goal in his past five contests as he had no trouble staying in the groove despite a one-week hiatus thanks to All-Star Weekend. Beyond the darts, Laine also has helpers in each of his past three games and he’s now at an even 27 points in 27 outings this season.
Of all the GMs in the league, steadfast Jarmo Kekalainen is unlikely to be swayed but what he’s seeing in the moment. That said, this run from Laine — far and away the best of his time in Ohio — is indicative of who he can be at his best. And let’s not forget, last year had to be a challenging time transitioning to a new team in a weird year, to say nothing of the fact Laine went through the agony of losing his father earlier this season. Maybe he’s just finding himself again — and who wouldn’t want this version of Laine on their team for as long as possible?
• It feels like we’ve known our eight Eastern Conference playoff teams since the season was six weeks old. At this point, though, it seems we can go a step further and say the two wild card clubs will almost certainly be Boston and Washington because neither one looks capable of climbing into a top-3 slot in their respective divisions. The B’s did manage a 2-0 win in Ottawa on Saturday, but aside from an 8-1-0 stretch to start 2022, Boston has been pretty ordinary this year. Washington, meanwhile, continues to plummet after the Sens rebounded from the loss to Boston by travelling to America’s capital on Sunday and dropping the Caps 4-1. On the night the calendar flipped from 2021 to ’22, the Caps held top spot in the Metropolitan Division. Since then, they’ve gone 6-9-2, falling to the first wild card. The Rangers are third in the Metro and now hold a three-point advantage on Washington with three games in hand.
• Let’s face it, we haven’t heard a lot of good things about Jeff Skinner since he signed his monster contract in Buffalo. The winger had a huge Super Bowl Sunday in Montreal, though, netting four goals to give him a very respectable 20 on the year. What’s more, the breakdown of that total is notable because Skinner actually has as many multi-goal outings as single-goal games this season; an even six and six.
Weekend Warrior
Jay Woodcroft started as a video coach with the Detroit Red Wings in the Zetterberg-Datsyuk era, was an assistant with Todd McLellan in San Jose for seven years when that team was always good, spent three more as an assistant on the Oilers bench at the start of the McDavid years, then another three-plus running his own show in the AHL before coaching his first NHL contest as the top shot-caller on Friday. Tip of the cap; that’s putting your time in.
Red and White Power Rankings
1. Toronto Maple Leafs (30-12-3) Since mid-January, the Leafs are getting a high-danger save percentage of 68.3 percent, the worst mark in the league.
2. Calgary Flames (26-13-3) Saturday’s 5-2 win over the New York Islanders marked six straight victories for the surging Flames. Just like that, Calgary now has the third-best points percentage in the West.
3. Edmonton Oilers (24-18-3) While the headline coming into Friday’s win over the Islanders was the team getting a new coach, the victory doesn’t happen without 37 saves from Mike Smith. However the Oilers crease situation plays out, you know that man is going to keep battling.
4. Winnipeg Jets (20-17-8) Winnipeg’s next four games are all at home and three of them are against teams presently on the outside of the playoff picture. Does their season depend on getting at least seven of eight points?
5. Vancouver: (22-21-6) Thatcher Demko’s 51-save performance in the 3-2 win over Toronto on Saturday made him just second Canucks goalie ever to make 50 saves in a Vancouver victory. (The other is ‘King’ Richard Brodeur.)
6. Ottawa Senators (17-24-4) The Sens needed the four-goal burst versus the Caps on Sunday after getting blanked in their previous two outings.
7. Montreal Canadiens (8-33-7) Most of the talk under new coach Martin St. Louis is about how rookie Cole Caufield already looks like a different player. Another young player who’s proving his worth? Centre Ryan Poehling, who picked up assists in both games with the new guy behind the bench.
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The Week Ahead
• Evander Kane visits his old club in San Jose on Monday night, as the Oilers drop in for two games in two nights in California, with the second being a huge one in Los Angeles on Tuesday.
• The gold medal match is set: It will be Canada and the U.S. resuming the best rivalry in hockey at the Olympic Games during the women’s final on Wednesday night.
• Warm up for that showdown — a late, late start in the east — on Wednesday by watching heavyweights Florida and Carolina do battle.
• Sidney Crosby and the Pittsburgh Penguins will visit Toronto on Thursday. Will Sid have goal No. 500 by then? He had two helpers on Sunday in New Jersey, but is still sitting at 499 career goals.
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