Jets hammered by Canadiens 7-1

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This article was published 06/03/2021 (1646 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

For one dreadful and very forgettable game, all the momentum the Winnipeg Jets had recently built up came to a screeching halt. Now the challenge will be ensuring Saturday’s 7-1 drubbing at the hands of the Montreal Canadiens becomes nothing more than a rare ugly night at the office.

“I think you just take a shower, get on the plane and get the heck out of town,” is how Jets captain Blake Wheeler suggested his club deal with its most lopsided loss of the season. “I think we might just have to toss that one in the trash,” added goaltender Connor Hellebuyck.

That would be a good idea, especially with three straight games against the first-place Toronto Maple Leafs on tap. The Jets certainly won’t want to spend a whole lot of time rehashing their miserable performance at Bell Centre.

“It’s not simple. And it shouldn’t be misconstrued as casual. Because the important part of that game is the next one. We had a tough night here. We have an entire hockey team that’s got a minus on them. Both goalies played. It was, at the very least, well spread out,” said coach Paul Maurice.

“We’ve been a good hockey team through the first (23), we had a very difficult night here (Saturday night). That’s certainly not the definition of our team, so we’ll move on and get ready for the next one.”

Indeed, the Jets entered the game having won six of their last seven to surge into second-place in the Canadian division, including three of those against Montreal. The Canadiens were going the other way, with just two victories in their past 10 games.

You’d never know which team was hot, and which team was not, given the way this one played out. Winnipeg falls to 15-8-1, while Montreal improves to 11-6-6.

After a fairly even, uneventful start, the game took a sudden turn at 15:29 of the first period when Montreal’s Josh Anderson got a gift from the hockey gods. A routine dump-in attempt by Jesperi Kotkaniemi bounced directly in front of the net, which had been vacated by Hellebuyck in an attempt to knock down a puck that never arrived.

“It definitely hit a stanchion. I know most Zamboni doors aren’t that smooth. The problem was it was an in-zone dump and they had it for a couple seconds and I wanted to try and break that up and help move the pace our way,” said Hellebuyck. “You don’t see those happen in zone too often. Those are usually dumps from the red line where the puck has time to start wobbling. That’s unfortunate that it landed all the way in the slot, right on a guy’s tape.”

Anderson’s 10th of the season gave the home team an early lead, and no doubt some good vibes after a couple rough weeks which included coach Claude Julien being fired and replaced by interim bench boss Dominique Ducharme.

A bad bounce against Winnipeg, for sure. But not something that one of the highest-scoring teams in the league, who have repeatedly erased multiple goal deficits this season, couldn’t overcome. And yet the hole only got deeper, this time through entirely self-inflicted wounds.

“Throughout a season there’s going to be nights like that. More often than not, the bounces are going to even out and tonight they didn’t. But you’ve got to give them credit. They were a desperate team. They’re trying to get on a roll here. They made their opportunities count,” said Wheeler.

Costly turnovers and broken defensive zone coverage quickly became the norm in a nightmarish second period which saw the Jets surrender four goals in the span of just over nine minutes.

Tyler Toffoli made it 2-0 at 7:03 after Jets defenceman Tucker Poolman coughed up the puck in his own zone. Brendan Gallagher made it 3-0 at 11:01, beating Nathan Beaulieu to the front of the Winnipeg net and re-directing a great pass from Philip Danault. Gallagher struck again at 14:25 as he was once again left alone in front of the Jets net, courtesy of Beaulieu who was as ghastly minus-four.

“Defensive coverage wasn’t great in the second period tonight,” said Maurice, who had seen enough. He gave Hellebuyck the pull at that point, replacing the reigning Vezina Trophy winner with backup Laurent Brossoit. If it was meant to light a fire under his sleepy squad, it didn’t work.

Joel Armia made it 5-0 at 16:05, beating Brossoit with a wrist shot. The former Jets winger is up to five goals this year, three of which have come against his old team.

Montreal increased the rout to 6-0 early in the third period after a sequence of events that perfectly summed up Winnipeg’s night. Beaulieu blasted teammate Adam Lowry with a shot, and then Nate Thompson struck Trevor Lewis with friendly fire a few seconds later. The play quickly went the other way, with Canadiens forward Paul Byron burying his own rebound pass Brossoit at 4:20.

Jeff Petry converted the touchdown at 8:20 when his shot from the point went through a maze of traffic and beat an unsuspecting Brossoit. Winnipeg finally got to Carey Price at 11:14 of the final frame while enjoying their first and only power play of the night. Mathieu Perreault scored for a third straight game, burying a rebound created by a Mark Scheifele shot.

Hellebuyck was beaten four times on 19 shots, while Brossoit gave up three goals on nine shots. Curiously, Maurice never switched up any of his struggling defence pairs or forward lines.

“There wasn’t a place to go. There wasn’t a line going and one line struggling or a matchup that was an issue. It’s almost a flat first period, we get bad break on the first goal and we lost 7-1, man. There was no place to go,” said Maurice.

The Jets will now face an 18-6-2 Maple Leafs squad that just lost two straight games in Vancouver. The two teams will play nine times in the next 25 games.

“I think the greatest thing about our team this year is the maturity level we’ve had since Day 1 of training camp. We’re going to use that again, build each other back up these next few days before we play a really good Toronto team,” said Wheeler.

“The guys in the room have a lot of character. I’m really excited for the next one now because I know we’re going to bring it,” added Hellebuyck.

mike.mcintyre@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @mikemcintyrewpg