Senators edge Jets 2-1

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This article was published 13/02/2021 (1666 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Winnipeg Jets’ healthy dose of the Ottawa Senators this season came to a temporary halt on Saturday.

The good news was supposed to be that the Jets were able to steal another valuable two points against the All-Canadian Division’s bottom dwellers. But it was the Jets who were the ones stuck in mud come the dying moments, surrendering a goal to Ottawa forward Brady Tkachuk with eight seconds remaining to seal a 2-1 Senators win.

The defeat snapped the Jets’ six-game win streak against the Senators dating back to last year, with four of those victories coming already this season. Prior to Saturday, the Jets had outscored the Senators 19-8 in 2021 to go with their 4-0 record.

“This one just pisses you off,” Jets head coach Paul Maurice said after the game. “It didn’t need to happen.”

The game-winning goal was set up by a miscommunication between goalie Connor Hellebuyck and Jets defenceman Derek Forbort. Hellebuyck left his crease to retrieve a puck and seemed to panic after touching it just ahead of the no-touch zone in the right corner. It looked as though Hellebuyck thought Forbort was coming to his aid, only for the puck to be turned over.

That led to Tkachuk getting a tip on a Mike Reilly shot, the puck bouncing at least twice off the ice and through Hellebuyck. The goal was Tkachuk’s fourth of the season and first in seven games.

“It’s just communication. Connor’s got the right to go and stop that puck, so it doesn’t get jammed on the wall,” Maurice said. “He thinks Forbort’s coming back to play it so he leaves it. Forbort’s going into the corner ‘cuz he thinks Connor’s going to give it to him. And then the puck rolled into the trapezoid so Connor can’t move it after that.”

Forbort said he couldn’t exactly remember the game-defining mishap, adding, “the time of it sucks. But we’ll talk about it, we’ll watch it, get better and move on.”

To suggest the defeat stung would be putting it lightly. A victory would have bumped the Jets from fourth to second place in the division, behind only the Toronto Maple Leafs. Instead, the loss drops Winnipeg’s record to 8-5-1.

The Senators, who entered the day with losses in 13 of their last 14 games, improved to 3-12-1.

It was the third time this season the Jets have lost a game in the final moments of the third period. They fell 4-3 to the Edmonton Oilers back on Jan. 24, with Oilers forward Leon Draisaitl scoring with 0.7 seconds remaining. And again on Feb. 9, this time to the Calgary Flames, 3-2, after Elias Lindholm scored a power-play goal with 1:42 left in regulation.

“Just can’t lose focus. Any team can score in any given moment; you can’t give them those chances,” said Jets forward Mark Scheifele, who scored his team’s lone goal. “You got to stay focused right till the buzzer and that’s the biggest thing. You can’t lose that thought in your head that the game’s not over until the buzzer rings.”

Maurice doesn’t see the late-game breakdowns as a troubling pattern. It’s not that he doesn’t value the lost points, he just sees the games as separate situations, even if they produced the same results.

“Today was just a gaffe, a miscommunication on a simple play,” he said. “Our third period was our best period.”

The bad news for the Jets on this day was supposed to be the fact that they aren’t going to see the lowly Senators for some time. After playing them five times already this season, the two teams won’t meet again until Apr. 12.

But judging by Maurice’s comments after the game, perhaps the Jets see a change of scenery as a good thing. While it seems unlikely, perhaps this is the start of a Senators team finally starting to hit its stride.

“The problem in viewing it from a piece of paper in terms of the record is that you would expect that. That would be your expectation, that we should be able to dominate a team offensively that’s given up the goals they have,” Maurice said. “If you watch them play at all you know that’s not the way any of their games have gone. Maybe a couple in the middle when they were out west. But they were better than Edmonton in Ottawa. And they were better than us…that’s a lot better team than you think. I don’t think their record indicates their play or the quality of players that they have.”

For the second straight game the Jets put out a lineup of 11 forwards and seven defenceman. In Thursday’s 5-1 victory over the Senators, the move was made to ease in Tucker Poolman after the Jets’ young defenceman missed a few weeks following a bout with COVID-19. On Saturday, it was more of an adjustment, after centre Pierre-Luc Dubois was ruled out prior to puck drop.

Dubois left practice early on Friday after he felt some tightness in an undisclosed area. Maurice said after the workout that he expected Dubois to play. With the Jets not used to carrying one fewer forward and one extra defenceman, it’s only natural the players viewed it as a significant adjustment to the norm.

“There’s a big adjustment. Obviously it changes the rhythm of things a little bit,” Scheifele said. “That (Thursday) game was the first time I’ve ever ran 11 and seven. So, there’s a bit of an adjustment to it, a little bit of finding your rhythm through that mix up and it’s just a matter of getting used to it.”

In an effort to find some offence, Maurice moved Scheifele in the second period from his line between Andrew Copp and Nikolaj Ehlers, reuniting him with a pair of familiar wingers in Blake Wheeler and Kyle Connor. But it would be Scheifele taking a turn with the fourth line that would result in the Jets first goal, coming at the 5:43 mark of the second period.

Kristian Vesalainen used every bit of his 6-3 frame to muscle past a couple Ottawa defenders before delivering a pass to Scheifele for the tap-in goal past Marcus Högberg, who was in for an injured Matt Murray. It was Vesalainen’s second point in 11 career NHL games. The 21-year-old played a team-low 7:43 of ice time.

“It was a pretty good game for our line,” said Vesalainen, who played with winger Trevor Lewis and a mismash of centremen.

The Senators evened the score just two minutes later. Evgenii Dadonov tipped a no-look backhanded pass from Colin White just over the glove of Hellebuyck.

“I thought we were pretty solid in all areas,” Forbort said. “We just couldn’t score that last one and then a little miscue at the end. It sucks.”

The Jets are back at it on Monday, when they travel to Edmonton for the first of back-to-back road games against the Oilers. Winnipeg is 1-1 in two games versus Edmonton this year.

jeff.hamilton@freepress.mb.ca 

twitter: @jeffkhamilton