Comrie keeps it close for Jets

Eric Comrie showed up to work on Tuesday night in Salt Lake City.

The majority of his Winnipeg Jets teammates? Well, it appears they were still licking their wounds — and perhaps feeling a bit sorry for themselves — after being eliminated from the Stanley Cup playoffs a night earlier.

Comrie, the club’s reliable backup goaltender, might qualify for hazard pay given the wide disparity in play for large stretches of play. He did everything possible to keep his club in the game against the Utah Mammoth in an eventual 5-3 loss inside Delta Center that was a lot closer than it deserved to be.

“There was a little bit of hangover from last night coming in from Vegas or we were real slow,” Jets coach Scott Arniel told CJOB, the team’s radio rights holder.

“Utah was really quick, and we turned a lot of pucks over and we didn’t get through the neutral zone and allowed them to get their rush game going. We got going halfway through that second and the third was a lot better. I thought Eric Comrie was fantastic. He hadn’t played in three weeks, and, you know, his first start in three weeks, I thought he was outstanding.”

Comrie’s final numbers don’t do him justice — 35 shots, 31 saves. He was largely all by himself during the game, a one-man show while the rest of his teammates did plenty of puck-watching until they finally came to life in the third period and nearly pulled off a comeback, which ended with Utah getting an empty-netter.

“We talked about it (during the second intermission), we’ve got to play for Coms. He was standing on his head the whole game. And we’ve got to help him,” rookie Jets forward Isak Rosen told CJOB. “I think that was one thing we did better and maybe brought us more energy in the third.”

Winnipeg has now dropped three straight games in regulation by a combined score of 18-6. They are 35-34-12 overall with one regular-season game remaining — Thursday’s home finale against the San Jose Sharks.

Utah improves to 43-32-6, locking down the first wildcard spot in the process. That’s a big deal, since it means avoiding the NHL’s top team, the Colorado Avalanche, in the opening round. Instead, they’ll face whoever wins the Pacific Division – either the Vegas Golden Knights or Edmonton Oilers.

The Jets, of course, have no such playoff scenarios to worry about. They are very much into “next year” territory, with the bulk of the team looking like they’ve already checked out.

“The schedule says 82 games. We got to play them all, no matter where we’re at,” said Arniel. “I know we’re all upset that we’re not in the playoffs, but we still have a game to play. Go home and make sure we do that.”

A long offseason awaits, one that should include a detailed autopsy of the entire organization along with plenty of soul-searching.

THE THREE AMIGOS

No surprise that Winnipeg’s top three scorers came together for most of the offence.

Kyle Connor scored his team-leading 39th late in the second period, with his team on the power play, to cut Winnipeg’s deficit to 2-1. Mark Scheifele and Gabe Vilardi drew the assists, adding to their career high point totals in the process.

Then, Connor and Vilardi set up Scheifele for his 36th with just under seven minutes left in the final frame to make it a 4-2 game.

Scheifele, who also had a goal and a helper on Monday in Vegas to break the century mark and pass Marian Hossa for the all-time single-season franchise scoring lead, is now up to 103 points on the year.

Vilardi, who hit the 30-goal mark in Sin City for the first time, is now up to 69 points (his previous high was 61).

And Connor — who has eclipsed the 90 point mark for the third time in his career — is now just one goal away from hitting 40 for what would also be the third time.

The talented offensive trio have led the way all season long. Consider this: They have combined for 105 goals, with the rest of Winnipeg’s roster accounting for the other 123.

THE KIDS CAN PLAY

With the stakes no longer as high, Arniel did some experimenting with his lineup.

The biggest move was breaking up the usual top trio of Connor-Scheifele-Vilardi, putting Rosen on the right side along with the dynamic duo. That was a nice bump for Rosen, who came from Buffalo as part of the Logan Stanley and Luke Schenn trade and looks to be a key future piece for the organization.

Obviously, he’s getting more and more comfortable as he’s playing games here, and we tried to move them around with different people,” Arniel told CJOB.

“And, tonight, I tried to put a young guy with two veterans on every line. We kind of mixed it up in the third a little bit. But at the end of the day, those guys were all gaining real in-game experience in tough buildings, Vegas, last night. Tonight, obviously, against a real good Utah team. But those guys, the Rosie’s, all those guys, it’s important that they go through these experiences and recognize what it takes to play at this level, on a consistent basis. And, that’s all part of the growth.”

Rosen rewarded his coach by scoring a third period power play goal which brought the Jets within a goal. His third as a member of the Jets, and sixth overall, showed the type of potential he posesses.

“I think I had put together a couple good games here last couple of weeks, but no goals or points like that. So it was nice to get one,” Rosen told CJOB.

“I’ve been feeling better and better every game, and especially last six games. It’s been quick, the games every day since I got here. Just the blink of an eye and I’ve played 20 games here. But it’s been really fun.”

Arniel also put the trio of Brad Lambert, Nikita Chibrikov and Brayden Yager — who made his NHL debut in Vegas on Monday — together in the third period. Although the Jets aren’t going to the playoffs, the Manitoba Moose are and these three will be counted on to play a big role in the pursuit of a Calder Cup starting next week.

Defenceman Ville Heinola was also inserted into the lineup for the first time since early March. The first-rounder, who is a pending unrestricted free agent this summer and likely won’t be back with the Jets, has been a perennial healthy scratch. However, he took the spot of Haydn Fleury — and just missed a wide-open net in the third period.

It’s possible the Jets could have even more of a youth movement for Thursday’s game against the Sharks. Winnipeg has three remaining callups allowed and might want to give some other prospects a cup of tea at the NHL level.

Potentially complicating matters is the fact the Moose are still fighting for playoff seeding in the final week of their regular season and are playing Wednesday in Illinois, then Friday and Saturday in Iowa. Manitoba is currently fourth in their division, which would mean having to play a best-of-three qualifying series against the No. 5 team.

But if they can get to the No. 3 spot — they are two points behind Texas with a game in hand — they avoid that qualifier entirely.

KEY PLAY

Utah going “bang bang” with two goals in 26 seconds — off the sticks of Nick Schmaltz and JJ Peterka early in the third period —gave the home team some breathing room.

THREE STARS

1. UTAH C Nick Schmaltz: 2 goals

2. UTAH C Logan Cooley: 1 goal, 1 assist

3. WPG G Eric Comrie: 31 saves

EXTRA, EXTRA

Winnipeg’s power play, which has been dormant for much of the season, had a good night and went 2-for-3. Utah went 2-for-5.

Mammoth goaltender Karel Vejmelka stopped 21 of 24 shots he faced in recording his 38th win of the year, which trails only Tampa’s Andrei Vasilevskiy (39) for the league lead.

The Jets were swept in the season series against the Mammoth — falling 3-2 in Winnipeg on Oct. 28 and then losing both outings in Salt Lake City, including a 4-3 overtime loss on Dec. 21.

Winnipeg’s injury list is a long one: Defencemen Elias Salomonsson (concussion protocol), and Neal Pionk (undisclosed) and forwards Morgan Barron (lower-body), Gustav Nyquist (undisclosed), Vlad Namestnikov (lower body) and Alex Iafallo (undisclosed) are all currently sidelined.

It would be a surprise to see any of them return for Thursday’s game.