FROM THE PRESS BOX
MIKE SAYS: Mark Scheifele’s scrap with Brett Howden was still a hot topic inside Winnipeg’s locker room, now nearly 48 hours after it occurred. It wasn’t the fight itself — but what it represented — that had everyone talking.
“Team unity. Team toughness. You don’t have to be the biggest guy, and it doesn’t always need to be the same guy stepping in,” said Morrissey.
“Our leading scorer goes in there and protects our second leading scorer on the play. It just shows the level of buy-in from the group and how tight our team is. I think it just shows within our room, more than anything, that everyone’s here pulling in the same direction and we have that total buy-in. It gives the team a huge boost and you felt energy in the building, too. Those can be really big moments for our group.”
It was good to see Cole Perfetti finally reach double-digits in goals as he converted a beautiful feed from Gabe Vilardi against the Golden Knights.
That line, along with captain Adam Lowry, has been generating tons of great looks in recent games, with Perfetti in the middle of most of them. I’ve lost track of how many times he’s hit the post lately, suggesting some bad puck luck was following him around.
Obviously, 10 goals isn’t much of a milestone for Perfetti, who had 19 and 18 over the past two years, but I still truly believe there’s a 25 to 30 goal scorer in him waiting to break out.
There’s no question that he and Vilardi have found some nice chemistry, which is a great development for the Jets in their attempt to find another duo beyond Scheifele and Connor to make some consistent offensive magic.
“We’ve had a lot of good looks,” said Vilardi, who thinks there’s another level his line can get to.
“I don’t know what the analytics are, or what the eye test is, but I think feeling the games out, we’ve had a lot of good looks, we’ve been hitting a lot of posts. We have to do a better job of finishing on those chances and being a little bit more deadly when we get those opportunities, and at the same time, make sure we’re on defensively. Because, at home ice, we’re usually against the other team’s top lines.”
Vilardi, meanwhile, will hit a milestone tonight as he plays his 72nd game of the year. That’s the most in a single NHL season for him, exceeding the 71 he played last year. The young winger battled some injury issues earlier in his career, which, he hopes, are now a distant memory.
KEN SAYS: Morgan Barron finished off his scrum on Wednesday, I had an opportunity to ask him a couple of additional questions that had been on my mind. The first was in relation to his summer training in Halifax with the likes of Nathan MacKinnon, Sidney Crosby and Brad Marchand and how that’s helped him progress as a player.
He provided some great insight on that process, so check out the article. One of the things I didn’t squeeze into the story revolved around whether or not there was an element of osmosis when you surround yourself with some of the most productive and competitive players in the NHL.
“You’d like to think so,” said Barron, who continues to show why he’s in line for a multi-year extension during the off-season.
Winnipeg Jets forward Morgan Barron (left) (Godofredo A. Vásquez / The Associated Press files)
The other topic that came out of the scrum was Barron sharing some thoughts about being in a mentorship role with his young linemates, Brad Lambert and Isak Rosén.
That led me to wonder who played that role for Barron when he was breaking into the NHL with the Rangers.
That was none other than Chris Kreider, who is now with the Anaheim Ducks after spending more than a decade as a tenacious power forward with the Rangers.
Barron shared that he lived with Kreider for two summers and learned a lot about his game and what it takes to be a consistent NHL regular.
Barron is still relatively young at 27, but his willingness to serve as a shepherd for a pair of players trying to become NHL regulars themselves is another example of something he brings to the table that doesn’t necessarily show up on the scoresheet.
For the Avalanche, look for them to play with a lot more energy than they had in their previous meeting with the Jets this month, when they arrived after a long delay related to their trip from Seattle.
Even though they’re on the verge of leading the league from wire to wire, the Avalanche are highly motivated to finish in top spot in the Central Division, so the Jets can’t afford a sluggish start out of the gate.
Colorado features plenty of star power, but their depth is an important part of the equation.
Don’t underestimate the importance of the return of Lehkonen either, as he’s the type of player that can help elevate any line that he plays on and is so responsible defensively.
PROJECTED LINES
WINNIPEG JETS
FORWARDS
- Connor-Scheifele-Iafallo
- Perfetti-Lowry-Vilardi
- Rosen-Barron-Lambert
- Koepke-Toews-Nyquist
- DEFENCE
- Morrissey-Pionk
- Samberg-Salomonsson
- Fleury-DeMelo
- GOAL
- Hellebuyck
- Comrie
HEALTHY SCRATCHES: D Heinola, D Fleury
INJURED: D Miller (lower-body), LW Niederreiter (lower body), F Namestnikov (lower body)
COLORADO AVALANCHE
FORWARDS
- Landeskog-MacKinnon-Necas
- Lehkonen-Nelson-Nichushkin
- Colton-Kadri-O’Connor
- Kelly-Drury-Kiviranta
DEFENCE
- Kulak-Makar
- Toews-Malinski
- Manson-Burns
GOAL
HEALTHY SCRATCHES: D Blankenburg, F Brindley, F BardakovINJURED: C Roy (upper body)
NOTABLE QUOTABLE
Jets forward Gabe Vilardi on facing the Avalanche:
“We need all the points we can get, obviously. So it doesn’t matter who we’re playing. We got to go in with the mindset that we’re going to win every game. And you know, we beat Colorado a few weeks ago at home. So why couldn’t we do it again? We’re going to go on tonight with the mindset and try and win.”
WHAT WE’RE WORKING ON
Ken has an early story coming on Vilardi, who will set a new career high in games played tonight. Mike will handle game duties of Jets vs. Avalanche. You can find both pieces online at winnipegfreepress.com and in Friday’s print edition.
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