Loss shows Jets’ strengths, flaws

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This article was published 25/09/2015 (3965 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Knowing you get to throw away the results from the NHL’s pre-season, decisions and evaluations move almost as high as winning on a team’s priority list.

Especially with a team like the Winnipeg Jets, who have numerous open jobs at forward and continue to see strong bids from many candidates.

Still, the scoreboard said the Winnipeg Jets dropped a third straight pre-season game, falling 4-3 to the Edmonton Oilers in overtime at the MTS Centre on Friday night.

Worse, the Jets blew a 3-0 lead with less than eight minutes left, dropping to 0-1-2 in their three exhibitions games.

So what mattered more to head coach Paul Maurice, the pluses or minuses?

“You have to factor both,” said Maurice, who had a half-dozen youngsters in his lineup again Friday. “Everybody makes mistakes. A young mistake isn’t going to set a guy back.

“He has to have done enough good to offset it, right? You’re looking for some signs, parts of his game that you like. And then you kind of add them up at the end of camp and see where you’re at.”

 

Some pluses

The Jets got their three goals from the two forward lines containing players battling for open roster spots.

Second-period goals from J.C. Lipon, Ben Chiarot and Andrew Copp came from what could be identified as the team’s bottom two lines of Lipon-Chase De Leo-Brendan Lemieux and Chris Thorburn-Copp-Nic Petan.

 

Hot start

Through two periods, Jets goalie Ondrej Pavelec was quick and sharp, stopping all 22 Oilers shots.

But in the final eight minutes, he was beaten by Anton Lander’s power-play goal, Lauri Korpikoski’s deflection, Rob Klinkhammer’s short-handed rebound and then Anton Slepyshev’s four-on-four overtime winner.

“Not for me,” Pavelec said about lessons on this night. “I mean the whole game is a lesson, not just the third period. It’s hard for guys. Some guys played in a different position, and some guys in played in the junior league last year. So it’s not easy for them.

“Of course, it’s 3-0 and you should be able to close the game, but it didn’t happen.”

 

Unhappy crowd

The 15,294 faithful at the MTS Centre were fairly incensed at referees Justin St. Pierre and Garrett Rank, who awarded the Jets the first five penalties of the game and six of the first seven.

In the end, the power plays were 8-5 for the Oilers, including the two-minute sentence to Blake Wheeler in overtime that led to a four-on-three, then eight seconds of four-on-four when Wheeler came out of the box but not in time to prevent Slepyshev from scoring.

“We’re responsible for all of them,” Maurice said of the penalties. “There’s a stick in the feet three or four times and they go down and whether you like the call or not, that’s just a penalty.

“Discipline is an area of focus for our team, and I’m very confident we’ll get better with it.”

 
Ladd, Little update

Captain Andrew Ladd and first-line centre Bryan Little have not yet seen pre-season action due to minor ailments, but were back in regular practice Friday morning.

Ladd said after that skate it’s a small issue unrelated to his off-season sports-hernia surgery, and he wasn’t far away. He also pointed out there was no rush to play in September, a sentiment echoed by coach Paul Maurice.

Maurice also said Friday he envisions the pair playing at least two games next week, possibly even as early as Sunday in Minnesota.

tim.campbell@freepress.mb.ca