No late-game heroics against Kraken

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This article was published 05/03/2024 (579 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

We’d gotten so used to watching the Winnipeg Jets rally for victories in the third period — back-to-back ones on the road this past weekend — that it’s easy to forget what that looks and feels like on the other end of the spectrum.

Tuesday night provided a stark reminder, as a 3-2 advantage early in the final frame turned into a 4-3 defeat to the Seattle Kraken at Canada Life Centre.

“That’s a frustrating loss. We certainly weren’t at our best,” said coach Rick Bowness.

Indeed, not a whole lot went right for the Jets in this one. Off the ice, a major internet outage shuttered most concessions for the entire game, no doubt resulting in plenty of lost food and beverage revenues for the crowd of 13,125.

On the ice, a series of costly mistakes, including a penalty that led to the game-winning power play goal with just 2:39 left in regulation on a shot that Vezina Trophy favourite Connor Hellebuyck would definitely want back. That resulted in one, or perhaps two, lost points in the standings.

“We played some good hockey. But we let them in the game a little too long and obviously they capitalized when they had the chance to,” said centre Mark Scheifele.

“It’s a crappy loss.”

Winnipeg falls to 39-17-5 while Seattle — playing for the second straight night following a hard-fought 4-2 victory in Calgary on Monday — improves to 28-23-11 as they push to get back in the Western Conference playoff chase.

The two teams will meet again on Friday, just hours after the NHL’s trade deadline, in Seattle.

Here’s a further look at how this one played out:

1) The Connor conundrum — The Jets found themselves in familiar territory, down 1-0 for the fourth straight game after Justin Schultz opened the scoring in the first period.

But Winnipeg got it back at 8:07 of the middle frame as Kyle Connor ripped his team-leading 26th of the season. It was a beautiful play off the rush, with Scheifele feeding him a crispy cross-ice pass for the one-timer. Vlad Namestnikov, the other winger on the line, made a heads-up play at the blue-line to stretch his legs to remain onside on the zone entry.

No doubt this was the type of effort and result that had Bowness smiling when it comes to the top line. Bowness has been looking for better puck management, and the Jets did it very well in this case.

Not so much later in the second stanza with Winnipeg on its first power play of the night and the top unit out for an extended shift. Connor, no doubt fatigued at this point, lost a board battle in the Seattle zone, which almost immediately resulted in a breakaway for Jared McCann who ripped a wicked wrister past Hellebuyck.

That kind of soft play simply can’t happen.

“The D were pinching when they shouldn’t have been going down. The forwards were too slow coming above and protecting the middle of the ice,” Bowness said of his club getting away from its staunch defensive identity.

2) Mark’s milestone — The assist for Scheifele was a special one, giving him 700 points in his NHL career (290 goals, 410 assists) as the 30-year-old centre played in his 778th career game.

Scheifele is just the second player to accomplish such a feat with Jets 2.0, following in the footsteps of former captain Blake Wheeler.

The crowd gave him a hearty round of applause when the milestone was announced, and the puck was tucked away as a souvenir. With a new seven-year contract extension set to kick in next season, Scheifele appears to be a lock to surpass both the 1,000 games played and 1,000 point mark.

“Just incredible. The organization is so fortunate that they – and we’ve been able to kind of witness his greatness,” said captain Adam Lowry, a fellow 2011 draft pick.

“Watching his maturation and his growth, coming in from an 18-year-old kid. I still remember he lit that exhibition on fire and everyone wanted him to be on the team. He went back to junior and little did we know that bigger things were to come for him. He’s such an important piece to our team, such an important piece in our room and piece in the community.”

3) Lowry and his linemates are lovin’ it — With the Jets once again in a hole, the new captain came through. Lowry scored with nine seconds left in the second period to even the game 2-2.

Dylan Samberg made a nice play to keep the puck in the Seattle zone, spotting Mason Appleton behind the Kraken net. Appleton then fed Lowry in the slot, who buried his ninth of the year — but his first in 22 games.

The Jets already have nine players, all forwards, who have hit double-digits in goals this year. Lowry is next in line to join them, with Namestnikov and Alex Iafallo, both at eight, likely to do so as well.

That line kept it going early in the third, with Lowry and Appleton setting up Nino Niederreiter for the go-ahead goal at 1:17. Just like that, a Jets team that had outscored its opponents 9-0 in the third period of comeback wins on Saturday and Sunday in Carolina and Buffalo had its first lead.

“It’s just responses to different things in the game. We go out and they had just scored a goal, so you at least want to get the momentum swinging back in your favour, maybe get the crowd back into it,” said Lowry.

“It’s just about our line trying to get in on the forecheck and trying to create some pressure. Just turn the tide, maybe get an offensive zone faceoff. Fortunately, it was a heck of a pass by (Appleton) and I was able to find the back of the net for once.”

Surely this one was safe, right?

4) The collapse — It only took 25 seconds for Seattle to get back on even terms. Tomas Tatar made a perfect tip of a Matty Beniers shot that came as the Jets got caught in their own zone chasing the Kraken around.

Then, the dagger, with the Jets have avoided the sin bin all night long only for Logan Stanley to slash Tatar’s stick in half with the Jets once again pinned deep.

Having already gone 0-for-1 on their own power play which included giving up the shorthanded goal, now Jets doubled down on their sorry special teams by surrendering the game-winner to Andre Burakovsky.

It came with just 14 seconds left in the man advantage, and almost immediately after a terrific, painful shot block by Appleton. There wasn’t much to the shot, just a shot that you’d expect Hellebuyck to stop at least nine times out of 10.

A final frantic push by the Jets, which included pulling the goaltender and getting a power play with 24 seconds left, proved futile.

Seattle goaltender Joey Daccord made a terrific save off Neal Pionk to preserve the victory, one of 30 saves he made on the night. Hellebuyck was beaten four times on just 24 shots.

“To go into the room 2-2, we liked our spot. We knew they got in late, with travel. We score early in the third and we like our chances,” said Lowry.

“Credit to them, that’s a gutsy win. They battled back and they were able to get one late. It’s too bad, I felt like for the most part, we had a lot of good looks, some chances that didn’t fall for us. Some minor tweaks to our game and we’ll be ready for them on Friday.”

5) Extra, extra – Stanley came into the lineup for Nate Schmidt, who has been battling a flu bug. Forward Rasmus Kupari was the other healthy scratch, while Gabe Vilardi missed a third straight game due to an upper-body injury.

The Kraken were without top defenceman Vince Dunn, who was hurt on Monday night after Flames forward Martin Pospisil crushed him from behind. He will have a hearing with the NHL’s department of player safety on Wednesday.

mike.mcintyre@freepress.mb.ca

X: @mikemcintyrewpg