Fiesty Finn a challenge for Jets

The Winnipeg Jets have a big problem.

A six-foot-four, 215-pound problem, to be more precise. His name is Mikko Rantanen, and the man known to teammates as “Moose” is running wild these days.

How exactly do you stop him?

Rantanen’s former employer, the Colorado Avalanche, couldn’t find an answer. They’re making tee times now after he torched them for 11 points (five goals, six assists) in the final three games of their first-round series, which went the distance.

Now it’s the Jets who are tasked with trying to corral the scorching-hot Finnish power forward. They’re not off to a great start, with Rantanen scoring all three goals for the Dallas Stars on Wednesday night in a 7:55 span of the second period. That’s all the offence the visitors needed to wrestle home-ice advantage away from the Presidents’ Trophy winners.

What Rantanen is doing so far in these playoffs isn’t just special. It’s historic. He’s now been involved in 12 straight Dallas goals — either scoring them himself or making an assist on them — which is an NHL record. He entered Game 1 against Winnipeg tied with Mario Lemieux (points on nine straight goals in 1992) before quickly making it his own.

He’s also just the third player in NHL history — and the first since Jari Kurri exactly 40 years ago — to record hat tricks in consecutive playoff games.

“Keep it going. Let’s see how long he can run this for,” Stars coach Pete DeBoer said following the 3-2 victory over the Jets. “Yeah, he’s rolling and he’s feeling it. Pretty impressive, what he’s doing. I mean, considering the opponent and the time of year and how he’s dominating games, really impressive.”

We take you back to February when the Avalanche, apparently believing they wouldn’t be able to meet Rantanen’s asking price as a pending restricted free agent, shipped him to the Carolina Hurricanes in a blockbuster trade. At the time, Jets coach Scott Arniel and several players expressed relief he was finally out of the Central Division and Western Conference.

Yeah, about that.

Rantanen was back in the blink of an eye, with the Hurricanes unable to sell him on a long-term hockey home in Raleigh. The Stars swooped in, landing him in yet another blockbuster and quickly getting his name on an eight-year, US$96-million extension.

We’d say that deal is aging pretty well, so far.

“He’s an absolutely fantastic player — big, strong and does a lot of really, really good things out there,” said Jets centre Mark Scheifele.

The Jets have first-hand experience seeing the type of damage Rantanen can do in the playoffs. While still with the Avalanche last spring, he had nine points in five games (two goals, seven assists) as Colorado eliminated Winnipeg in the first round.

He may be wearing different colours now, but he’s the same lethal player who doesn’t need much time or space to make an impact. His first goal came when he poked home a loose puck during a goal-mouth scramble, while his second came on a perfect tip of a Thomas Harley point shot. His third, on the power play, was a bank shot off Jets defenceman Dylan Samberg.

“We all know how elite he is. He’s really done it these last few games and throughout his whole career,” said Nino Niederreiter. “Always a fantastic player, but we’ve got to find a way to shut him down and not make it too easy on him.”

Easier said than done. Consider that on Wednesday night, Arniel wisely had his shutdown line of Niederreiter, Adam Lowry and Mason Appleton out at five-on-five against Rantanen’s line with Roope Hintz and Mikael Granlund as much as possible.

“I thought the Lowry line did a great job,” Arniel said after the game.

He’s right. They did. The problem is, DeBoer also did a great job in double shifting Rantanen, getting him out at times with fourth-line skaters Sam Steel and Evgenii Dadonov and, it would appear, catching the Jets a bit by surprise and tilting the ice at times.

“He’s used to playing big minutes in Colorado with (Nathan) MacKinnon. We’ve traditionally been a four-line team so he’s taken a little bit of a haircut ice-time-wise with us,” said DeBoer.

“But I’ve been trying to supplement that a little bit because he is used to getting more ice and it’s a lot easier when he’s going like he is now, obviously. I don’t think it matters to him who he’s out there with. He’s trying to make a difference when he’s on the ice every time he’s out there.”

The game is won between the lines on the ice, of course. But give credit to a veteran coach like DeBoer for finding a way on the road, without the benefit of last change, to create some mismatches. That’s something Arniel will no doubt want to guard against heading into Game 2 on Friday night.

“He’s just somebody that you always have to know when he’s on the ice,” Arniel said. “Whenever you face elite players, you have to know where they are. Obviously, he’s feeling it coming off of Game 7. We’ve got to know when he’s on the ice. He’s a guy that you have to make sure especially you tie up that stick of his.”

Arniel mentioned having plenty to video to review with his club during Thursday’s off-ice session, and we suspect a huge chunk of that involved clips of Rantanen doing his thing. There’s only a handful of legitimate superstars like him in the league, and the Jets certainly didn’t face anything similar in their first-round series against the St. Louis Blues.

Although he struggled mightily during his brief time with Carolina and got off to a slow start with the Stars, Rantanen has clearly settled in and found the perfect fit in Dallas. It doesn’t hurt that the team is filled with fellow Finns.

“Obviously, they’re good, dear friends of mine and I knew them from before, before even I came to Dallas,” Rantanen said Wednesday night. “But all the guys, the rest of team are good friends of mine, too. They’ve been very welcoming and helping me a lot to settle in.”

That’s bad news for Central Division foes like the Avalanche and Jets.

They don’t give out the Conn Smythe Trophy for playoff MVP until the end of the Stanley Cup Final, but Rantanen is making a compelling case as the overwhelming early favourite.

The Moose is loose and showing no signs of slowing down.

mike.mcintyre@freepress.mb.ca

X and Bluesky: @mikemcintyrewpg