Schmidt ready to rock after reset Veteran blue-liner back on track after brief sojourn to press box By: Ken Wiebe Posted: 5:16 PM CDT Wednesday, Oct. 25, 2023

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This article was published 25/10/2023 (1055 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

DETROIT — Perspective can be a powerful thing, even for one of the most positive people on the planet.

Fortunately for Winnipeg Jets defenceman Nate Schmidt, his somewhat circuitous route to playing 600 NHL games has allowed many twists and turns that ended up being valuable lessons.

Even with more than a decade of experience, it’s nearly impossible to prepare for the moment you get called into the coach’s office and be told you’re going to be a healthy scratch.

“It still stings,” Schmidt said during a candid conversation earlier this week. “It was frustrating because you want to play every game.”

The Jets (3-3-0) are back in NHL action Thursday when they face the Detroit Red Wings to open a two-game stretch against Eastern Conference opponents.

One day you’re taking a moment to soak in the fact that an undrafted college free agent had done enough to celebrate hitting a memorable milestone and several days later, you’re out of the lineup and left to try and pick up the pieces.

This is where Schmidt leans on his wealth of experience.

“I’ve been through it before,” he said matter-of-factly.

By his own admission, Schmidt realizes his first few games this season featured some hiccups.

Suffering a nagging lower-body injury in the first pre-season game against the Edmonton Oilers when Evander Kane fell on his leg certainly didn’t help matters, preventing Schmidt from seeing any game action until the season-opener against the Calgary Flames.

An inopportune icing proved costly late in regulation time.

“Draw weight would have been nice,” said Schmidt, using the curling analogy for what he was trying to do on the play in question. “We had talked about keeping it simple, keeping it simple because it was my first game. Your idea of keeping it simple is not to try to hold it and handle it. I was thinking ‘I’ve got to get this thing off my stick quick.’

“As a veteran, I needed to have more poise. Just take a second of understanding where the pressure is coming from.”

“As a veteran, I needed to have more poise. Just take a second of understanding where the pressure is coming from.”–Nate Schmidt

Mistakes happen, but when you’re trying to get back up to the frenetic pace the games are being played at, sometimes those errors can be compounded.

“After missing camp, I was trying to get up to speed and there were just a few things that (head coach Rick Bowness) didn’t like about my game that I wasn’t going to disagree with,” said Schmidt. “I have a much clearer understanding of what the standard needs to be after this.”

Schmidt had a solid summer of training and was feeling like his skating was allowing him to regain some of the offensive flair he displayed before suffering the injury.

“It was really a bummer,” said Schmidt. “You put in so much work over the summer and I came into camp and felt really good. I was ready to rock. I still feel like I’ve been up (in the rush).”

Getting involved with the second wave of offence has always been an important part of Schmidt’s game, but it’s an aspect that tapered off last season.

“I was so worried about getting scored on that I wasn’t thinking about the other part of my game,” said Schmidt.

Jets associate coach Scott Arniel felt that Schmidt needed to simplify his game after the uneven start.

“He was trying so hard it seemed like, prior to being out of the lineup, to create stuff, to do things. It was almost like everything he tried backfired on him,” said Arniel. “Sometimes a reset, like the one he got, kind of helped him.”

“Sometimes a reset, like the one he got, kind of helped him.”–Scott Arniel, Jets associate coach

Schmidt agreed with that assessment, though he’s not a real subscriber to the theory that watching a game is what provides the true benefit.

“People always say that you’re going to learn from watching in the press box and truthfully, I couldn’t disagree more,” said Schmidt. “I think that learning comes from having to adapt your game (while playing).”

Schmidt’s ability to make the necessary adjustments was on display in each of the past two games.

He responded with a solid outing against the Edmonton Oilers on Saturday, one that included him being on the ice late in the three-on-three overtime.

Three nights later against visiting St. Louis Blues, he made a smart play at the offensive blue line to help set up Kyle Connor for the game-winning goal in a 4-2 victory Tuesday.

Those are the types of efforts Schmidt will be looking to build on as the season moves along and continues the push toward the next milestone.

“It’s amazing that this is where we are — after all of the stuff that has happened. I feel a lot of gratitude,” said Schmidt. “It’s really special, to say that an undrafted guy can make it through 600 games. I remember a stat that someone told me when I was signing. ‘You know that only four per cent of guys that are undrafted play NHL games, right?’

“A part of me internally, might have had some choice words or some language, but it helped me because I was pretty fired up to prove that person wrong.”

ken.wiebe@freepress.mb.ca

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