Enemy no more

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 17/10/2014 (4001 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The bright lights and cosy confines of the MTS Centre normally take some getting used to.

NHL teams over the first three years of the Winnipeg Jets 2.0 have had a wide range of comments and reactions to the league’s smallest building by capacity, from clever, heckling fans to noise levels.

The good news for one of the newest Jets, Mathieu Perreault, is he needs no introduction to that. He’s had plenty of experience here, at least 10 games, but always on the enemy side.

“I think I’ve been here more than all of the other buildings in the league,” Perreault said on the eve of the Jets’ home opener, tonight against the Nashville Predators (7 p.m., TSN 3, TSN 1290).

“My first full year in Washington was the first year they were in the league and in the division with the Caps. And we came in four times. Divisions were the same the next year.”

Perreault, the darting, 26-year-old centre, even had experience prior to that, helping the Hershey Bears win the AHL’s Calder Cup here in 2009.

He’s seen and felt the Winnipeg buzz, which has enhanced his anticipation for tonight’s first regular-season home game for his new team.

“Yeah, especially when you’re on home ice now,” he said Thursday. “The fans are great and especially in this building. It’s one of the most exciting in the whole league.

“I’m excited to be on the good side for once.”

Coming over on the first day of last summer’s free agency on a three-year, $9-million deal, Perreault said there was no mystery about his new home ice.

“No, you don’t notice,” he said about the arena’s size. “The game’s the game. When you’re on the ice, you don’t look up. The noise makes you feel like it’s one of the biggest. You don’t notice this is small.”

The Jets’ new third-line centre was a big-time point producer in junior, collecting 233 points in 132 games in his final two years in the QMJHL.

His best NHL season was his last, with the Anaheim Ducks, with 43 points in 69 games, but he said he’s spent no time wondering why there isn’t more offence in his game today.

“Not really. Junior is a long time ago,” Perreault said. “To get into the NHL, you have to at some point be one of the better players in junior or the league before.

“I’ve always been an offensive guy who gets points and for me it’s all about feeling good, feeling like I play good, that if I don’t get any points, I feel like I’ve helped the team win.”

That, Perreault said, is the key to what he does.

“I’ve been fortunate enough to be on winning teams ever since I started my pro career,” he said. “My first two years in Hershey, we won back-to-back Calder Cups. I moved to Washington and we were always finishing near the top of the conference and when I moved to Anaheim, we finished on top of the conference.

“To me it was never about how many points I was going to get but to feel like I’ve played well, get chances and help the team getting wins. So far in my career, I’ve been able to do that.”

These things are known about the 5-10, 175-pound native of Drummondville, Que.

Things you may not have heard:

• When he turned pro in 2008 after being drafted by the Caps in the sixth round of 2006, he did something with his signing bonus that he had always wanted to do.

“Bought my first car,” Perreault said. “A BMW 335 coupe, two doors. I was pretty excited about that, my first cheque. That was awesome.”

• He admits he was something of a trouble-maker as a kid. “Kind of true,” he said. “I had a lot of energy when I was young. Ask my mom. I was very energetic. I’d be non-stop. That was who I was, a little guy running around. I’m still the smallest guy and I’ve always been that.”

• He just loves dogs and is now the proud master of Bubba, an Old English Sheep Dog, and Meo, a Golden Doodle. “Bubba is for Bubba Watson,” he smiled.

• And that gives away the fact he’s also a golf nut. “I golf a lot in the summer, around home mostly with my buddies,” he said. “I like to get out a couple, three times a week for sure.”

The best course the single-digit handicapper has ever played?

“Congressional Country Club. Fortunate enough to play it when I was in Washington.”

• Often, players don’t like talking about their habits or superstitions. Perreault was happy to share this one with reporters in Washington when he was there, that he’d rather not have short hair.

“Look at my hair, still kind of long,” he said, laughing. “I’m getting older and it’s creeping back a bit (in front) but it’s something weird, that every time I’ve cut my hair I’ve gone in slumps. When I had long hair I was doing good. In Washington they kept at me, made me cut my hair at some point. A little pressure there to cut it and shave but I’ve always like to let it flow.

“Hopefully this year… I’m not planning on cutting my hair until the end of the year so I should end up with a pretty good flow by the end of the year.”

tim.campbell@freepress.mb.ca