No fun in watching and waiting Wanting to contribute while recovering from injury frustrating for Dubois By: Jeff Hamilton Posted: 7:00 PM CDT Monday, Mar. 20, 2023

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This article was published 20/03/2023 (901 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

ST. LOUIS — The hardest part about suffering back-to-back injuries for Pierre-Luc Dubois wasn’t the work to get back on the ice. That, of course, wasn’t easy, with a rehab regimen that required working alone with support staff, along with all the other challenges that come with getting back up to game speed.

For Dubois, the Jets top centre and power forward, it was having to watch his teammates do battle knowing there was little he could do to help. What made matters worse was the Jets were clearly feeling his absence, going 3-4-1 over the eight games he was sidelined.

“The wins, it’s fun to be around the guys and everybody is in a good mood. But the losses, when you feel like you could have helped, maybe, to see all the disappointment and frustration in the room, obviously, you have some of that, but it feels like you’re not as much part of it when you’re not on the ice and you’re just kind of trying to support them and trying to maintain a positive attitude,” said Dubois, in an interview with the Fress Press ahead of Sunday’s 3-0 road loss to the St. Louis Blues.

Dubois, who is fifth on the team in scoring with 24 goals and 32 assists for 56 points in 63 games, was first out with an undisclosed lower-body injury, something that had been nagging him for some time and he wanted to be sure didn’t get worse. He returned to the lineup on March 6 in a 3-2 overtime loss to the San Jose Sharks, then missed the next five games with what was listed as something different, this time upper-body.

There was speculation that Dubois might have suffered a head injury based on head coach Rick Bowness’s unwillingness to answer whether the 24-year-old was undergoing concussion protocol, but nothing was confirmed. Dubois preferred not to delve into the specifics, but did lament his bad luck in getting bitten twice by the injury bug and explained some of the obstacles he’s facing trying to return to the level of play he and his teammates expect from him.

“When it rains, it pours, it feels like. For the most part of my career — knock on wood — I’ve been fine,” Dubois said, noting he had never suffered an injury until he arrived in Winnipeg, including throughout his time playing in the QMJHL and the first five years of his NHL career. “It’s just really good to be back and to be able to help push towards the playoffs.”

The Jets (39-29-3) are in a fight for their playoff lives, currently occupying the final wild-card spot in the Western Conference with a few teams nipping at their heels. Coaches and players have admitted to scoreboard watching on a nightly basis these days; heading into Monday’s action, the Calgary Flames (31-24-15) are four points behind with a game in hand and the Nashville Predators (34-26-8) are five points back with three fewer games played.

Indeed, it’s going to be a fight to the regular-season finish line, with only a dozen or so games remaining for each team. If the Jets have any chance of creating noise in the playoffs, they’ll need to get the best from everyone, including Dubois.

Fairly or not, Dubois and the way he plays the game — hard-nosed, with an edge to go with his scoring touch — is something the Jets desperately lack elsewhere, making his role all the more critical. Prior to getting injured, he, too, went through a stretch of inconsistent play, with just one point in six games.

Dubois returned for the Jets recent two-game road trip through Nashville and St. Louis.

Admittedly, he started slowly against the Predators Saturday but found his groove as the game went on, even setting up Neal Pionk for the game-winning goal in overtime (he also missed on a breakaway in the dying seconds of the third). Dubois went pointless against the Blues the next night, as did all his teammates in the 3-0 loss, but wasn’t on for a goal and finished with four shots over 15:18 of ice time.

Any player who misses eight of nine games is going to have some rust. With only 11 games remaining, time is not on his side and Dubois knows that. He’s not far off from getting to where he wants and needs to be.

“At this time of the year, the game is so much faster than it was at the beginning… so you miss those and it’s not a setback in terms of when you come back, it’s more like re-adjusting to the pace of play” Dubois said. “There were some plays (against Nashville) that I wanted to make but I was maybe a quarter of a second too late and at the beginning of the year I would have been fine, I would have made the play. That’s kind of the challenge, but I’m getting more and more used to it as I go on.”

There’s added pressure to return to form because of how the Jets have been playing in recent weeks. While they’ve liked some of their games and have believed some nights they’ve been deserving of a better fate, collecting points, not silver-linings, is what matters.

The Jets have five wins in their last 17 games (5-10-2). Their power play has been among the worst units in the NHL and the effort, quite frankly, has not matched that of their opponent on far too many nights. Their scoring touch has simply dried up, leaving goalie Connor Hellebuyck to stand on his head to earn wins and he has struggled of late to carry that burden.

The scariest of all is the Jets, now through 71 games, don’t appear to have an identity. If they do, it’s been far too inconsistent or, more accurately, non-existent at the most important time of the year.

“It’s not just a switch that you just flip come playoff time,” Dubois said. “At this point of the year, wins and two points are the biggest thing, but at the same time you also want to build towards the start of the playoffs. You want to know what team is going to show up every night and, for us, that’s the most important thing right now.

“We still have some details we want to get better at and there are some aspects of our game we know we can do a lot better. These last games before the playoffs, if we can really, 100 per cent, all be on the same page as to what our identity is, that’s the most dangerous Jets team we can offer come playoff time.”

The Jets have 11 games to figure that out, beginning Tuesday at home against the Arizona Coyotes. The Coyotes, a franchise that has seemingly done everything in its power to tank this season, won’t be an easy out. They are 6-2-2 in their last 10 games and are riding a four-game winning streak.

“Our worst games can’t be bad and our best games, hopefully we win, but our bad games where maybe we don’t feel well, you can’t just hope and pray that (Hellebuyck) makes 55 saves,” said Dubois. “When the playoffs come — Game 1, Game 7 — they’re all as important, we can’t have two different teams show up during the series. That’s the challenge for us these last games and I’m sure we can finish the season off well.”

Jeff.Hamilton@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @jeffkhamilton