D-man can’t believe he blew it

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This article was published 17/12/2016 (3260 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

People watching the Winnipeg Jets play Thursday night likely noticed defenceman Josh Morrissey gazing up to the rafters of the MTS Centre after flubbing what looked like a gimme goal against the Florida Panthers.

Morrissey had joined the rush and was streaking to the net midway through the first period when he was spotted by right-winger Blake Wheeler, who connected on a perfect pass. With Panthers goalie Roberto Luongo caught out of position, Morrissey fired the puck and then threw back his head in complete disbelief when it sailed wide left.

The rookie blue-liner was still thinking about the miss Saturday afternoon, although his irritation level would have been a whole lot higher had the Jets not pulled out a 4-3 victory in a wild shootout finish.

“Watching on video after, it’s definitely hard to put that one out of my mind,” he said, following morning practice at the MTS Iceplex. “That stuff happens. I think I tried to rush it a little bit. I probably had time to stop it and quickly shoot it because I had the whole net. I tried to rush it and it kind of rolled off my blade wide. I would like to have it back.

“But I’m sure if you keep jumping into the play and you’re out there with guys that really, throughout our whole lineup, have the ability to make (that pass), you’re going to get more of those chances.”

In 33 games, Morrissey has just one goal this season, his first NHL tally that came in mid-November against the Chicago Blackhawks.

Collectively, Winnipeg’s blue-line crew has nine goals — including four from Dustin Byfuglien — through nearly 10 weeks of the 2016-17 campaign, third-lowest in the Western Conference. Only the Colorado Avalanche (six goals in 29 games) and Vancouver Canucks (eight in 30) have fewer.

The Jets (14-16-3) host the Avalanche (11-17-1) Sunday at 2 p.m. at the MTS Centre. Winnipeg is 1-0-1 against Colorado in a pair of games in Denver this season, highlighted by a 37-save shutout effort by Michael Hutchinson in a 1-0 triumph in late October.  

Morrissey is part of a mobile top-four that includes his partner, Byfuglien, who leads all NHLers with 915 minutes, 21 seconds of ice time this season, an average of 27:44 per game. He’s ackowledged as a bit of a rover, a guy who regularly jumps up into the offensive zone.

Winnipeg also has solid-skating defencemen in Jacob Trouba and Toby Enstrom, who have just one goal apiece. The club has been missing Tyler Myers (two goals this year), another blue-liner with a penchant for joining the rush, for the last 17 games with a lower-body injury.

Morrissey said a shortage of scoring from the back end is not for a lack of a plan.  

“It’s part of our overall team system that we want to have defencemen jumping into the play as that fourth man. If you look at the NHL nowadays, that’s the way the game is,” he said. 

Jets head coach Paul Maurice said the advanced NHL statistics suggest the club is near the top of the league in terms of offensive-zone puck possession time. That said, the Jets defencemen don’t need to make risky decisions but must make better use of their opportunities when the puck’s already in the opposing end.

“We’d like more production from our back end, from the blue line, (with) pucks to the net,” said Maurice. “This is something that we’ve talked about a great deal… getting pucks to the net faster, we’ve got to get different kinds of screens and then we’ve got to get better outs for our D. So, some of it is how they shoot the puck. We think there’s more there.

“We don’t need more offensive-zone time, it’s not that they’re not getting their looks or getting their shots to the net, we’re middle of the pack with that in terms of shot attempts, shots through, so we can improve there.”

Trouba, who scored his first and only goal of the year last weekend in a 6-2 defeat to the Calgary Flames, said while all players love scoring, creating chances can’t leave the club vulnerable.

“It’s one of those things — you gotta take it when it’s given,” he said. “We’ve got to play defence first. And when our defensive game’s good, that’s when the offence comes to our D.”

jason.bell@freepress.mb.ca          

Twitter: @WFPJasonBell