Blues even series in afternoon drubbing

ST. LOUIS — This is what adversity looks like.

If the Winnipeg Jets want to rewrite the narrative about coming up small in big moments during the Stanley Cup playoffs, the time to respond is upon them.

Now that the Jets have watched a 2-0 series lead evaporate into thin air, it’s time to see what this group is made of.

After getting thumped 7-2 in Game 3, the Jets vowed to be better to start Game 4, and for more than 19 minutes they were true to their word.

But after giving up a goal with 22.7 seconds to go in the first period, the Jets lost their grip on this game — and the series — after a 5-1 loss to the St. Louis Blues on Sunday afternoon at Enterprise Center.

“We know we have home ice. We have two days to regroup and then (get) back in front of our fans,” said centre Mark Scheifele. “It’s not what we wanted, but it’s a best two out of three series now.”

In the simplest terms possible, the Jets will either rebound and win two of the next three to advance to the second round or, if things go the opposite way, they will be lamenting a third consecutive first-round exit — and be facing many of the same questions as they did last May.

Trying to eliminate a Blues team that has now won 14 consecutive home games is a big enough challenge as it is.

Game 5 is set for Wednesday at Canada Life Centre, with puck drop expected to come around 8:50 p.m.

For the second time in as many games, the Blues chased goalie Connor Hellebuyck out of his net, this time just 2:01 into the third period.

Hellebuyck has allowed 11 goals during the past two games, and while Sunday featured a deflection from Jake Neighbours and a Justin Faulk blast that caromed in off Neal Pionk, Hellebuyck quite simply isn’t playing at an elite level right now.

During the final question of his post-game presser, Jets head coach Scott Arniel gave his goaltender a vote of confidence — and made it clear this was a two-way street.

“I’m 100 per cent confident in Connor Hellebuyck. His resumé speaks for itself,” said Arniel. “At the end of the day, we need to be better in front of him. We need to let him see some pucks. There were a couple there we didn’t let him see. There’s things that we have to do to help him.

“He knows he has to do things that help us. And that’s how it’s been all year long. We’re all in this together. You know what, it’s just a situation that we’ve got to put our best foot forward when we go home. Like I mentioned, we worked our tails off for 82 games to get home-ice advantage. Well, it’s a best of three now. Now we’ve got to make sure we take care of business.”

The best way for the Jets to take care of business is to tighten defensively and to do a better job of clearing the front of the net so that Hellebuyck can see a few more of those point shots the Blues generated during Games 3 and 4.

“It comes down to one-on-one battles,” said Jets defenceman Luke Schenn. “Obviously, we have to do a better job. Everyone doing a better job of making sure (Hellebuyck) is seeing the puck. They’re getting sticks on it and they’re screening him, doing a pretty good job (at that). At the end of the day, this time of year, that’s where games are won and lost.”

Blues head coach Jim Montgomery urged his team to show more determination in getting to the ice around the blue paint and they’ve won a lot of those one-on-one battles during the past two games to even up this series.

“We’re owning the net front and our goaltender’s making saves,” said Montgomery, who applauded Jordan Binnington’s 30-save effort.

Let’s take a closer look at where things stand after Game 4.

RINSE AND REPEAT

Hellebuyck hadn’t been pulled all season and now he’s got the hook in consecutive starts.

Blues fans serenaded him with chants of “Connor, Connor” and “We want Connor” during the course of the contest and you can be sure that Hellebuyck is motivated to get things turned around.

To this point, Hellebuyck has turned aside 67 of 82 shots on goal that he’s faced and has a 4.24 goals-against average to go along with a .817 save percentage.

For the sake of comparison, Binnington lowered his goals-against average for the series to 2.29 and raised his save percentage to .907 after Sunday’s effort.

THE MISSED OPPORTUNITY

The Jets understood that the Blues were going to be an extremely tough out, given the way that they’d been playing coming out of the 4 Nations Face-Off break, and that’s proven to be true.

“You’ve got to reset. I don’t think anyone expected this to be an easy series, at least, personally, I didn’t,” said Schenn. “I watched the Blues (the) last two months of the season — they’re the hottest team in the NHL for a reason, and have the best home record and didn’t lose at home down the stretch.

“At the end of the day, when you’re up 2-0 in the series, there’s nothing to protect. Maybe we sat back and thought we’d defend that a little bit rather than you’ve got to keep going and keep pushing. It’s a best of three now, we’ve got a great crowd at home and we’ve got to clean up some things and move on to the next one.”

Scheifele felt the Jets “unravelled a little bit” after the strong start and now it’s up to them to work through some of the issues that allowed the Blues to steal the momentum in this series.

“We unravelled in the last seven, eight minutes of that second period. I don’t know if it’s the moment we’re at or whatever, but it’s uncharacteristic of our group,” Arniel concurred. “We are so good at how we defend and I thought we did a really good job of it for close to 30 minutes. Other than giving that goal up at the end of the first period.

“We can go back, look at it, talk about it, make sure we handle these situations better than we did (on Sunday).”

Arniel reiterated that situations like this were part of the reason why the Jets worked so hard to finish first overall.

“They took advantage of home ice. We played 82 games to get home ice,” said Arniel. “We put ourselves in this position, we really wanted to come home either winning it or up 3-1. We’re not. Now it’s a best of three. Our best players have to be better than their best players.”

THE KEY PLAY

Seconds after the Jets had killed off a minor penalty, Brayden Schenn drove to the net and converted a pass from Colton Parayko for an insurance marker at 17:23 of the second period that made it 3-1 for the Blues.

THE THREE STARS

1. Jake Neighbours, Blues, The feisty winger scored a goal and added a pair of helpers.

2. Colton Parayko, Blues, The towering blue-liner chipped in two assists and three blocked shots.

3. Brayden Schenn, Blues, The captain scored his first goal of the series and added an assist.

EXTRA! EXTRA!

Jets right-winger Gabe Vilardi took the warm-up, but didn’t take any line rushes and was ultimately scratched. How close did Vilardi come to entering the series?

“He was a game-time decision, so he’s closer,” said Arniel. “He’s off the injured reserve. He’s close now.”

Vilardi has been out of action since Mar. 23 and could provide a boost if he’s able to suit up in Game 5.

The Jets made two lineup changes on Sunday. Along with Dylan DeMelo returning after missing Game 3 due to illness, fellow blue-liner Haydn Fleury drew in on the third pairing for Logan Stanley. Fleury had just under 13 minutes of ice time, including 42 seconds while shorthanded. Arniel wouldn’t say whether or not Stanley was a healthy scratch or if he was banged up.

Colin Miller was scratched for DeMelo after making his series debut in Game 3.

ken.wiebe@freepress.mb.ca

X and Bluesky: @WiebesWorld