Central Division the place to be for struggling teams

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This article was published 30/12/2018 (2442 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Who turned off the lights in the Central Division? Long considered to be the home of some of the NHL’s best and brightest, there appears to be a major power outage going on these days. All of which is good news for the Winnipeg Jets, who haven’t lost any ground following a few recent stumbles.

While some may be panicking about the recent lacklustre play of the Jets — two straight losses and winners of just two of their past five games — the numbers show Winnipeg has actually managed to increase its cushion on top of the division during that stretch.

Second-place Nashville — the reigning Presidents’ Trophy winner — is in a nosedive right now, going 0-5-1 in the past six to sit four points behind Winnipeg heading into action today, with the Jets owning a game in hand.

Third-place Colorado has come back down to Earth following a hot start, with a 1-4-1 record in its past six that leaves the team five points back of the Jets, who also have a game in hand.

Over in Dallas, two straight wins haven’t masked some major issues for the fourth-place club, which included CEO Jim Lites publicly eviscerating top stars Tyler Seguin and Jamie Benn the other day. The Stars are 4-6-0 in their past 10 and seven points behind Winnipeg (who have a game in hand), while holding down the final Western Conference wild-card playoff spot.

And fifth-place Minnesota, which came into Bell MTS Place on Saturday afternoon and won 3-1, is still just 1-4-1 in its past six games. The victory over the Jets leaves the Wild 11 points back of the Central lead and still four points under the playoff line.

“When you go back and look at the story of each team over the course of a year, there’s going to be stretches. You do everything you can to make sure they’re not long stretches, where you’re struggling,” Jets head coach Paul Maurice said of the recent woes among top-tier teams in the division.

“I spend my entire day, year, trying to figure out my own hockey team, and wouldn’t presume to understand anybody else’s. It’s a Central Division story, I think they’re all good teams that are all capable of winning. They had a tough patch, but that won’t be their year.”

The only teams actually on any kind of a run right now are sixth-place Chicago (5-1-0 in their past six games) and seventh-place St. Louis (5-3-0 in their past eight). However, both fell so far behind the rest of the pack early in the season that it’s likely a case of too little, too late. Chicago is 14 points behind Winnipeg (which has three games in hand), while St. Louis is 16 back.

Maurice predicted a few weeks ago that the Blackhawks and Blues would start to get on track, which could spell trouble for anyone thinking they represent an easy two points.

“There’s too many veteran players on those teams that just can’t suffer through that. They find a way. And sometimes, the negative stretch is long enough that in some ways the pressure comes off,” he said.

Winnipeg saw that first-hand recently in a disappointing 1-0 defeat to the Blues, and other Central clubs are learning that lesson the hard way, as well. All of which makes for a compelling divisional race, even if it might represent more of a turtle derby than a sprint right now.

And, while they haven’t lost any ground, you could also argue the Jets have missed a golden opportunity recently to put some major breathing room between them and the pack.

“You go through 82 games, there’s going to be times where teams deal with injuries. Obviously, there’s some key injuries within the division, some guys that have been out. That probably plays a big part of it. But, it’s a long year, and you go through stretches where things maybe aren’t going well for every individual team, and times when it’s going great,” Jets defenceman Josh Morrissey said.

If you’re going by combined goal differential, the Central is currently the second-best division in the NHL at plus-three, well behind the Atlantic (plus-28), but ahead of the Metropolitan (minus-eight) and Pacific (minus-23). If you’re going by combined point percentage, the Central is third-overall (1.09 points earned per-game), just ahead of the Pacific (1.08) but trailing the Metro (1.11) and Atlantic (1.17).

For the record, the Jets aren’t spending much, if any, time worrying about what teams around them are doing. They’re simply focused on their own schedule and getting their house in order.

“You’re going to go through that adversity. And, sometimes, there’s a little bit of that adjustment period. We don’t expect that to last long. They all are great teams. They’re going to grind it out to the end, and they all can win on any given night no matter who’s in the lineup,” centre Mark Scheifele said.

“For us, it just has to be us focusing on our game, us playing our game and getting the wins when we can.”

mike.mcintyre@freepress.mb.caTwitter: @mikemcintyrewpg