Jets miss chance to gain ground on Stars in 4-3 OT loss

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This article was published 04/03/2022 (1282 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

There’s been a reoccurring theme each time the Winnipeg Jets and Dallas Stars take the ice together. And while it’s resulted in an exciting brand of hockey, it hasn’t turned out all that well for the Jets.

For the fourth game this season, the Jets and Stars have required extra time to determine a winner, and for the third time Winnipeg has finished outside the winner’s circle. On Friday, it was a 4-3 defeat in overtime in front of 13,466 at Canada Life Centre.

The Jets finish the regular-season series against the Stars at 1-0-3, earning their lone victory on home ice in a 4-3 shootout win back on Nov. 2. The other two games were won by the Stars in Dallas, both in overtime — 4-3 Feb. 11 and 3-2 Feb. 23.

The Jets are 3-10 when games go to overtime or shootout this season, with the 10 defeats tying the Philadelpha Flyers for most in the NHL.

“It’s not from lack of opportunity. If we weren’t getting chances, we weren’t getting opportunities, it would be a concern,” Jets interim head coach Dave Lowry said after the game. “In every game that we’ve lost, we’ve had very good looks. You look at it again tonight, we get a one-timer from just above the hashmarks and the goalie makes a save and they come back and they score. We were getting opportunities.”

Tied 3-3 in the late stages of overtime, Dallas forward Jason Robertson completed his first NHL hat trick, scoring his team-leading 26th of the year with 29.9 seconds left in the extra frame. Robertson took advantage of a tired Jets group, walking in alone and beating Connor Hellebuyck blocker side to seal the win.

With the loss, the Jets dropped to 24-21-10 and are now six points back of the Nashville Predators for the second wild-card spot in the Western Conference. Things don’t get any easier for Winnipeg on their current four-game homestand, with dates against the New York Rangers (35-15-5) Sunday and Tampa Bay Lighting (36-12-6) Tuesday.

The win improved the Stars to 31-20-3, moving them into the first wild card spot in the West. The two points also puts Dallas just two shy of the Minnesota Wild for third place in the Central Division.

“It’s frustrating that we had a pretty solid game, had a lot of chances and, obviously, we liked this one more than we liked the two in Dallas,” Jets centre Adam Lowry said. “So, it’s frustrating but you get a point and you got to regroup. We got to get ready for New York.”

The Stars opened the scoring five minutes into the game, capitalizing on some sloppy coverage by the Jets in the defensive zone. Robertson registered his 24th of the season, retrieving a pass from Ryan Suter near the side of the net before stick handling around Hellebuyck for the 1-0 lead.

Hellebuyck, who finished with 30 saves, had come up big on a shot from Joe Pavelski in close just seconds prior to the goal, only for the Stars to regroup in the neutral zone and come back on the attack. It was the first time in the last five games the Jets had surrendered the game’s opening marker.

The Jets outshot the Stars, 16-14, through 20 minutes but had fewer quality scoring chances than the visitors. Winnipeg squandered three trips to the power play, while their best opportunities came during the penalty kill.

With Nikolaj Ehlers serving a hooking penalty, Adam Lowry was sprung in alone on the first of two shorthanded breakaways on the night, but was thwarted by a Braden Holtby poke check. Then moments later it was Kyle Connor setting up Paul Stastny, only for the one-timer shot to be swallowed up Holtby, who finished with 39 saves in relief of starter Jake Oettinger.

“The first (breakaway), I feel like I had him and he catches me with the poke-check,” Adam Lowry said. “The second, I don’t know if you could call it a breakaway, I feel like I’m hooked just as I’m making my move. It’s frustrating that you don’t get an opportunity when you think you should have one.”

The parade to the penalty box continued into the second period, with the Jets serving the first two, followed by another three straight for the Stars. In total, the two Central Division rivals combined for 18 penalty minutes through 40, with only a pair of coincidental roughing calls in the third.

It would take until the final second on the Jets sixth and final power play of the game for Winnipeg to hit the scoreboard. And it would come from the second unit, as Stastny wired home an Andrew Copp pass to make it a 1-1 affair. Nikolaj Ehlers, playing for the first time since Jan. 18 after suffering a knee injudy, drew the second assist.

The play came just seconds after Copp was awarded a goal, only for a review of the call resulting in it being overturned, as the puck had hit the crossbar and out of harm’s way. Twenty-six seconds later, Stastny notched his 14th of the season.

“Nobody celebrated. Usually when you shoot it, it happens fast but you kind of have a feeling whether it went in or not,” Stastny said of Copp’s goal. “But we mentally stuck with it. Dave kept us out there, and we had, 30, 25 seconds to get going. I was telling Lowsy even before that goal there were a couple times they had the puck and we just kept pounding them, keeping the puck in. It’s those second, third chances that we took advantage of and that’s how we scored.”

Just when it looked like the game would go into the second intermission locked at 1-1, the Stars jumped on a costly turnover near the Jets blue line. Neal Pionk attempted to drop a pass to Ehlers, who blew a tire in his attempt to reteive it, falling to the ice and sending Dallas on a 2-on-1 the other way.

Robertson made no mistake on the play, cradling a pass from Thomas Harley before beating Hellebuyck with a deke to the five-hole. It was Robertson’s 25th goal and fourth in the last four games.

That set up a desperate third period for the Jets, who wasted little time taking some pressure off by scoring just 1:21 into the frame. Connor scored his team-leading 33rd of the season, banking a shot off a few Stars and into the back of the net to make it 2-2.

“I thought we played real hard. I thought we deserved better. We did a really good, just look at the way that we came out and started the third period,” Dave Lowry said. “We were on the puck, we did what we wanted to do. We did what we talked about and we created a lots of opportunity.”

Winnipeg took its first lead at the 12:19 mark of the third, with Stastny converting his second goal of the game thanks to a nifty pass from Blake Wheeler from behind the net that fooled Holtby. But like we’ve seen from these teams all season, the Stars found a way to even the score with minutes to go in regulation.

A Denis Gurianov shot from the point found it’s way through traffic and past Hellebuyck with 4:32 remaining on the clock. At first glance, it looked like it might have been touched by Benn, but the goal was credited to Gurianov.

Jets defenceman Nathan Beaulieu left the game late in the first period with a suspected injury to his left leg. Beaulieu got tied up with Suter and fell awkward into the boards. He’ll be evaluated Saturday.

Jeff.Hamilton@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @jeffkhamilton