Canadiens ground Jets in OT

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This article was published 04/11/2017 (2864 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Winnipeg Jets head coach Paul Maurice wasn’t terribly impressed with the men in stripes Saturday night, but neither was he pleased with his own club’s performance against the visiting Montreal Canadiens.

Connor Hellebuyck’s brilliant play, though, was the exception.

Another superb goaltending performance — Hellebuyck finished with 45 saves — was pretty much squandered by the Jets, who settled for a point in a 5-4 overtime defeat to the Canadiens.

Habs left-winger Max Pacioretty scored at 3:07 of the extra session with Winnipeg a man short. Veteran blue-liner Tyler Myers applied a needless cross-check to Alex Galchenyuk, giving the visitors a 4-on-3 power play.

Galchenyuk, parked behind the net, set up the winner with a terrific feed to the Canadiens captain — who, just moments before, took out defenceman Dustin Byfuglien with a hit that bordered on interference. Byfuglien and Toby Enstrom both lost puck battles, leading to the clincher.

The Jets (7-3-3) have gone seven games without losing in regulation, but have come up dry three times in overtime, dropping decisions to Pittsburgh, Columbus and Montreal.

Maurice said it was easy to identify what went wrong in OT.

“Well, we had a couple of chances to clear that puck, get ’er down, and we didn’t get to it,” he said.

He was asked to comment on the key play that preceded Pacioretty’s fifth goal of the 2017-18 campaign.

“Yeah, I did (see the interference). That was pretty clear,” he said when asked about the contact on Byfuglien.

Montreal defenceman Jeff Petry evened the game with just 4:44 left in the third period on a shot from well out, with Andrew Shaw causing havoc in front of Hellebuyck. Tomas Plekanec also scored in the third period for the Canadiens.

Shaw was a thorn in the hosts’ side all night, scoring two goals, including a tally early in the second period when he stripped the puck from Hellebuyck’s mitt and swatted it in.

Maurice felt his team didn’t play well enough to claim a victory.

“I’m responsible for our group. We weren’t real good tonight. Our goalie was great, got us a point. We weren’t real quick,” he said. “As far as the refs, there’d be lots of stuff we didn’t like. I wasn’t looking for explanations from them on why they made the calls.”

The 24-year-old Winnipeg goalie was adamant the officials missed a call.

“It was definitely in my glove and I picked it up and I wasn’t bobbling it. I had it in the pocket and I picked it up from my pad up to eye level and then the stick comes under and knocks it out,” he said.

Hellebuyck also said he was shocked there was no interference call handed out to the Canadiens in overtime.

“It was definitely a penalty. I think everyone was waiting for the call,” he said. “… Pretty sure the guy came and swept under (Byfuglien’s) feet as he was getting ready to ice the puck. That’s kind of right in front of the ref, too. That’s for another day.”

Regardless, Winnipeg was badly outplayed for the first 40 minute, outshot 17-8 in the first period and 16-4 in the second. Montreal attacked in waves but was stymied time and time again by Hellebuyck, who has yet to lose in regulation time this year (7-0-2).

Noticeably absent was the dogged pursuit of the puck the Jets demonstrated in recent victories over the Dallas Stars, Minnesota Wild and Pittsburgh Penguins. Without that quickness, the Jets took six minor penalties. The penalty-killing unit yielded three goals, despite Hellebuyck’s best efforts.

“(Hellebuyck’s) been huge back there. He’s made some saves that kept us in games,” Wheeler said. “These guys were funnelling everything to the net all night, so the shot clock may be a little bit high for the sheer fact they’re throwing everything at the net.”

Winnipeg was deadly on the power play, going 3-for-3 thanks to Patrik Laine, with his sixth goal, Nikolaj Ehlers, with his eighth, and Blake Wheeler, with his fifth on a splendid individual effort — racing down the left wall, cutting in and tucking the puck past former Jet Al Montoya.

The goals by Ehlers and Wheeler sparked the Jets to a 4-2 lead. Andrew Copp supplied his second of the year early in the middle period after a brilliant set-up from Brandon Tanev.

Montreal’s No. 1 puckstopper, Carey Price, is out with a lower-body injury, so Montoya filled in. He finished with 19 saves. Things had not been going well for Montreal (5-8-1), which occupies the basement in the Atlantic Division and is just 3-6-0 on the road.

Winnipeg practises today at noon and then flies to Dallas late in the day. The Jets meet the Stars on Monday night and then pay their first visit ever to the entertainment capital of the world Friday where they’ll battle the upstart Las Vegas Golden Knights.

The three-game road swing wraps up Saturday in Glendale against the lowly Arizona Coyotes.

jason.bell@freepress.mb.ca Twitter: @WFPJasonBell