It didn’t take long for the Winnipeg Jets to return to their frustrating, under-achieving ways.
The offence went ice-cold, the top forwards were no-shows, and the result was predictable — a 3-0 loss to the St. Louis Blues at Enterprise Center on Sunday night.
The Jets wasted a golden opportunity to build on Saturday’s 3-2 overtime win over the Nashville Predators and solidify their standing in the Western Conference against a St. Louis team that will not make the playoffs this season.
“Any time you lose a game at this time of year, I feel like it’s a lost opportunity to get yourself a little further in the standings,” said Jets defenceman Nate Schmidt, who came closest to scoring, with two shots going off goal posts.
“The go-to for our group right now, is ‘We’ve got to find a way.’ We’ve been playing better, we had been playing better, but we’ve got to have results right now.”
The Jets wasted a golden opportunity to build on Saturday’s 3-2 overtime win over the Nashville Predators and solidify their standing in the Western Conference against a St. Louis team that will not make the playoffs this season.
“Any time you lose a game at this time of year, I feel like it’s a lost opportunity to get yourself a little further in the standings,” said Jets defenceman Nate Schmidt, who came closest to scoring, with two shots going off goal posts.
“The go-to for our group right now, is ‘We’ve got to find a way.’ We’ve been playing better, we had been playing better, but we’ve got to have results right now.”
While the Jets play their next two games against non-playoff teams — Tuesday at home against Arizona and Thursday against the Ducks in Anaheim — Sunday’s result proved that it makes little difference.
The Jets simply can’t find a way to score goals consistently — not on the power play, nor at five-on-five — no matter the opponent, at the moment. They’ve been shut out twice in the last three games.
“It was a mix of them (playing well defensively) and us just not doing it,” Jets winger Nikolaj Ehlers said. “It seemed like whenever we got the puck, we were going east-west or south. We just weren’t fast enough tonight and that’s something we’ve got to get back to.”
Head coach Rick Bowness talked about the team needing to play with urgency and desperation in key road games this weekend, but those traits were conspicuously missing on Sunday — at least to the eye of the casual observer.
Bowness saw it differently.
“I mean, it’s there,” he said. “The guys are trying. They are. Listen. We talked after. We want to enjoy this. We’re in a playoff race. We’re in a playoff hunt. We have to work for it. We also have to enjoy it but, with that, you have to be prepared and get engaged and stay engaged throughout the course of the game.
“We started off great. They scored and then we backed off. And at this point, you just can’t back off.”
The Jets’ top-scoring forwards were invisible, as they have been for several games.
Mark Scheifele hasn’t scored in five games, Kyle Connor in nine and Blake Wheeler in 17. Connor had two shots on goal in the game, both with the Jets net empty in favour of an extra attacker late in the third, while Scheifele did not record a shot on goal.
“It sucks,” Ehlers said. “You want to win games. It doesn’t mean you have to win them with six goals every night but you want to score enough to win games and we haven’t been doing that.”
It was a relatively easy night for Winnipegger Joel Hofer, playing just his fourth NHL game. Hofer, who backstopped Canada to a gold medal at the world junior championship in 2020, stopped 33 shots to earn his third career NHL victory and a shutout (technically he shared it with Thomas Greiss after leaving briefly to get his skate repaired).
Schmidt said this is no time for the Jets to hang their heads.
“You’re in a dog-fight right now,” Schmidt said. “You’re in the fight and you’d much rather be here than where we were (last year). You’d much rather be here and give yourself a chance. I like that we have 11 games to do right. We’ve battled to be here all year and things haven’t been awesome lately for us but, at the same time, you’re here for a reason and you have a chance to go do something with this.”
Kasperi Kapanen scored in the first period for the Blues, Nathan Walker beat Connor Hellebuyck in the second and Jakub Vrana rounded out the scoring with a breakaway goal with eight minutes left in the third.
It was the ninth time in the last 10 games that the Jets have given up the first goal and there was a continuation of the power-play woes that have plagued the team for several games — they went 0-for-3 and are 0-for-14 in the last four contests.
Blues defenceman Torey Krug was penalized heavily in the first period for going after Jets centre Kevin Stenlund, who had taken Walker into the boards. Krug received a double roughing minor, an unsportsmanlike conduct minor and a game misconduct.
Still, the Jets squandered the four-minute power play, getting only two shots on goal.