Jets quite cross about lacrosse goal

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This article was published 17/12/2019 (2090 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The highlight reels will be showing Andrei Svechnikov’s latest goal-of-the-year candidate for days to come. Just don’t expect the Winnipeg Jets to spend any time applauding the effort. 

Svechnikov, the skilled 19-year-old Russian winger in his sophomore season, used a lacrosse-like move to pick up a loose puck with his stick behind the Winnipeg net, carry it in the air and wrap it past a stunned Connor Hellebuyck on Tuesday, sparking his team to a 6-3 victory at Bell MTS Place.

It was a marvel to see, and hard to fathom that it could be pulled off at this level. But the Jets weren’t quite as impressed, considering Adam Lowry was clearly tripped by Jordan Staal with no penalty call a few seconds earlier, causing the turnover that led to the go-ahead tally. The game, which was tied 2-2 at the time, took on a decidedly one-sided slant from that point on. 

“Instead of us going on the power play in a 2-2 game, it’s 3-2 for them and they get some momentum,” Lowry said, before cautioning against pinning the outcome on the unfortunate turn of events. “There are missed calls, they happen. You can’t let that affect your whole game. We’re not going to blame a call on our effort. They were the better team.”

Winnipeg falls to 20-12-2 as their five-game home winning streak is snapped. Carolina improves to 21-11-2 and have gone unbeaten in regulation in the past six games (5-0-1). 

There’s no question Svechnikov’s goal, at 13:10 of the second period, put the Jets on their heels. Sebastian Aho on a breakaway at 16:46 and Staal on the power play at 18:43 gave the visitors a commanding lead before the middle frame was done. 

“The missed trip for the goal, yeah, it’s tough. You’d like the refs to be perfect. Like us, they’re human. They do a pretty darn good job. I would say putting it on the refs in that scenario wouldn’t do justice to the job Carolina did,” said captain Blake Wheeler.

It’s actually the second time Svechnikov has pulled the move with success this year, first accomplishing the feat against Calgary’s David Rittich. Prior to that, it had never been done in an NHL game. 

Now we get to debate which Andrei Svechnikov (@ASvechnikov_37) lacrosse-style goal is better… pic.twitter.com/oaMNhdBZjP

— NHL (@NHL) December 18, 2019

“Well there’s one way to defend it. Unfortunately we didn’t have a guy there to do that,” Wheeler said, a reference to Lowry being taken out of the play. “Give him a ton of credit. A little time and space behind the net, that’s a pretty sweet play. I guess if you leave him alone behind the net he’s capable of doing it. That’s going to make its way around the league pretty quick.”

There was plenty of talent on display as the two teams battled for the first time this season in a fairly wide-open affair. But the Hurricanes made the Jets look slow on this night.

“Hands and feet, right. They skated real well. And their hands knocked an awful lot down. But we have to take responsibility for a big chunk of that and how we moved the puck, how we moved our feet,” said coach Paul Maurice. 

Carolina forward Lucas Wallmark opened the scoring at 18:23 of the first period with Jets defenceman Josh Morrissey serving a delay-of-game penalty. Winnipeg tied the game with eight seconds left in the period, as a Nikolaj Ehlers shot was tipped by Jack Roslovic for his seventh of the season. 

Aho gave the Hurricanes a 2-1 lead at 8:39 of the second, burying a beautiful spinning, no-look pass from linemate Teuvo Teravainen. Fellow Finn Patrik Laine tied it at 12:18, deflecting a Nathan Beaulieu point shot for his 11th of the year.

The wheels came off, with Svechnikov, Aho and Staal all scoring in a span of 5:33 to break the game open. The Jets actually had a couple great chances right after the Svechnikov goal but prior to the next two tallies, with Wheeler hitting the post and Lowry robbed by a Petr Mrazek pad save.

“It’s going to happen over 82 (games)where they miss one that’s real clean in front of them. And it ends up in the back of your net. That’s a tough one. I thought they were better than us in the second. The first period’s even, but they were better than us almost right to 2-2 there. It can’t be the end of your game, but is seemed to be at that point,” said Maurice.

“Their guy made two or three real big saves in a block of about four minutes after that. And we had a bunch go in. It was a tough one.”

Hellebuyck was given the hook after 40 minutes, giving up five goals on 23 shots. Laurent Brossoit mopped up in the final period, surrendering a goal to Staal early in the frame and stopping the other four shots he faced. 

“Five’s enough for any one guy. I didn’t think that it was going to be easier for him in the net in the third. If there was a spark for us in the third it wasn’t going to be on our goaltender,” said Maurice. “We’ve got a bunch of games every second night here and I wanted to get Laurent some minutes that would open up the opportunity for Connor playing a bunch of games ahead of us.”

Mark Scheifele brought the Jets within three with a one-timer off a Wheeler feed on the power play, but that’s as close as they’d get. 

It proved to be an extra costly loss for the Jets, as forward Andrew Copp suffered an upper-body injury while attempting to throw a hit early in the second period. He crashed awkwardly into the boards and seemed to be favouring his head and neck area. Copp went to the dressing room, briefly returned to the bench, only to leave again and be ruled out for the rest of the night. Maurice had no update on his status post-game. 

The Jets are already without third-liner Mathieu Perreault, who is in concussion protocol after being victimized by a blindside hit last Sunday. Winnipeg started Tuesday’s game with no extra healthy forwards on the roster, so a couple of call-ups from the Manitoba Moose seem likely. 

Winnipeg wraps up the three-game homestand on Thursday night against the Chicago Blackhawks.

“You’ve got to digest it, sleep on it, watch the game (Wednesday) and see what we can do better and make some adjustments for Chicago. The beauty of this league is you get another chance right away, you don’t have to wait too long,” said Lowry.

mike.mcintyre@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @mikemcintyrewpg