WITH MORRISSEY'S RETURN, JETS PLAY AN ALMOST PERFECT GAME
MVP goaltender Connor Hellebuyck will carry the Winnipeg Jets into Dallas with the Divisional Final series all tied up.
Friday night at Canada Life Centre, the Jets beat the Diving Dallas Stars 4-0 as Hellebuyck was superb. He made 22 saves to record the fourth post-season shutout of his career while Nikolaj Ehlers scored his first two goals of this year’s playoffs as the Jets were smart, tough and efficient for 60 minutes.
In fact, the Jets played a perfect playoff hockey game – build an early lead, control the play, don’t give up much, but when you do give something up, get great goaltending.
Hellebuyck provided the great goaltending.
It certainly didn’t hurt that Josh Morrissey was back in the lineup and his presence was an obvious boost right from the opening faceoff. In fact, someone has to say it: Morrissey is a much better defenceman than everybody’s belled cow, Colorado’s Cale Makar. Sorry, convince me otherwise. Morrissey controls the pace of play, stick checks top players one-on-one and comes up with the puck, keeps the front of his net clear and can create offence with his speed and puck-handling skills.
Morrissey was tremendous in Game 2. But so too, was Hellebuyck.
“I liked our game a lot more tonight, especially the first half,” said captain Adam Lowry. “He’s (Hellebuyck) incredible and was especially good in the second period.”
With the win, the Jets evened the best-of-seven Central Division final at one win apiece. Game 3 goes Sunday afternoon at 3:30 at American Airlines Center in Dallas.
The Jets opened the scoring on the power play at 3:35 as Gabriel Vilardi pounced on a loose puck in the crease to push his first goal of the playoffs past Stars’ goalie Steve Oettinger. Nikolaj Ehlers and Josh Morrissey picked up the assists.
The Jets made it 2-0 at 7:07 when Ehlers’ pass across the crease went off the skate of Esa Lindell and eluded Oettinger. Haydn Fleury and Mark Scheifele drew the assists.
The Jets had two or three good scoring opportunities in the next 13 minutes as they dominated the game. Winnipeg outshot Dallas 13-7 in the period. Dallas had nine of their 13 shots on their two power plays.
In the second period, the Jets took a 3-0 lead as Adam Lowry roofed a shot from in close at 11:02. It was his fourth goal of the playoffs as Dylan DeMelo and Nino Niederreiter grabbed the assists.
Dallas outshot Winnipeg 9-6 in the period which was odd considering how much time was spent in the Stars’ zone. Regardless, Dallas had four outstanding scoring opportunities, but Hellebuyck made highlight-reel style saves on all four of them.
The amazing stat through the first 40 minutes was that Winnipeg led 3-0 despite winning only 34 per cent of the faceoffs. They did, however, win almost every battle in the corners. Scheifele, Lowry, Appleton, Vilardi and Iafallo were outstanding in the trenches. Winnipeg also applied a bit of the aggressive St. Louis Blues strategy from Round 1. They hammered Mikko Rantanen at every opportunity and by the third period, the Dallas scoring star was tired and frustrated. The rest of the Stars were diving all over the ice hoping to create a power play situation. It was, at times, comical to watch.
In what was a relatively uninspiring third period for Dallas, the Jets put the cherry on top at 16:20 when Ehlers flipped one the length of the ice into an empty net to make it 4-0. DeMelo picked up his second assist of the night.
It was a tremendous effort by the Jets and while Hellebuyck and Ehlers were the stars on the stats sheet, everyone contributed. As team efforts go, it was almost perfect.
The Jets outshot Dallas 25-21 while Dallas outhit Winnipeg 43-37. Dallas won 57 per cent of the faceoffs.
The best line of the night? Ehlers had two goals and an assist for three points and was plus two with seven shots on goal, five shots that missed the net and one blocked shot.
Game 3 goes Sunday afternoon in Dallas while the Jets announced that Game 5 in Winnipeg on Thursday night will start at 8:30 p.m.
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