JETS BEAT CANUCKS 3-1 FOR THIRD STRAIGHT WIN
Cole Perfetti sent the patrons attending the Winnipeg Jets’ fifth straight sellout crowd home happy.
Meanwhile, as the fans chanted MVP! MVP! at Jets goaltender Connor Hellebuyck, the Winnipeg won its third straight game and pulled three points ahead of the Washington Capitals in the race for the President’s Trophy.
Thanks to the brilliance of Hellebuyck and a goal by Perfetti that will be talked about for a long time, the Jets beat the desperate Vancouver Canucks 3-1 to improve to 51-19-4.
Now, with 106 points, the Jets have pulled three points ahead of Washington for first overall. The Capitals fell 8-5 to the Buffalo Sabres in Washington and are now 47-17-9.
Meanwhile, the Jets are also six points ahead of Dallas in the race for first in the Western Conference.
With the win, the Jets still have the best home record in the NHL – 28-6-4. Meanwhile, Hellebuyck leads the NHL with 43 wins, and is now only two wins away from breaking his own franchise record for wins in a season. He had 44 in 2017-18.
Meanwhile, Mark Scheifele extended his point streak to five games and Kyle Connor scored his 38th goals of the campaign.
It was a big bounce back win against a Canucks team fighting for a playoff berth. On March 18, the Canucks whipped the Jets 6-2 in Vancouver.
“We remembered what they did to us when we played in their barn a couple of weeks ago and we had a sour taste in our mouths,” said Mason Appleton, who scored the winning goal and was the game’s first star. “We’re a resilient team. This was a full effort for 60-minutes tonight.”
The opening period was typical of a Jets afternoon game. It was mostly lethargic, the Jets got nothing from a one-minute two-man advantage, had a number of scoring chances and shot wide and gave up a goal to the Canucks, late in the period.
At 18:55 Tyler Myers sent Pius Suter in alone on Hellebuyck and he beat the Jets goaltender high to the stick side and Vancouver, who really did nothing for the entire period, took a 1-0 lead into the intermission. Now, the goal was allowed although Suter was clearly offside. The Jets challenged the call, but the geniuses in Toronto who sit in front of the monitors were looking at something else and didn’t see that Suter was a foot offside. As a result, the goal counted and Winnipeg was assessed a minor penalty for delay of game that would carry over to the seond period.
The Jets outshot the visitors 9-6 in the first and won 52.9 per cent of the faceoffs but they simply were not engaged around the Canucks net.
In the second period, the crowd sat quietly as virtually nothing happened for the first nine minutes. Sold out Canada Life Centre was eerily silent until Mark Scheifele hit Kyle Connor in full flight across centre ice. Connor flew into the Canucks zone and fired a low, hard wrister that went between the legs of Canucks goaltender Thatcher Demko and suddenly the game was tied. More importantly, the crowd woke up.
It was Connor’s 38th goal of the year and Scheifele’s 45th assist. Colin Miller also drew his 10th assist of the season.
The period ended with the game tied at one apiece. Vancouver, who two power plays to none for the Jets, outshot Winnipeg 11-7 and were up 17-16 after two periods. After 40 minutes of play, the Jets had won 55 per cent of the faceoffs while Vancouver had outhit Winnipeg 34-15.
In the third period, the Jets got the go-ahead goal from Mason Appleton, who scored the way he plays. Nikolaj Ehlers ripped a shot toward the net that Demko handled, but Adam Lowry worked to get the puck loose and with players falling all over the ice, Appleton crashed the net and banged home the loose puck in the crease. Lowry and Ehlers drew the assists as Winnipeg took a 2-1 lead at 6:24.
Then at 12:11, Cole Perfetti scored a highlight-reel spectacular that nearly brought the house down. First, he made a move that might have broken both the ankles of Canucks defenceman Derek Forbort, who was beaten like a rented mule. Then Perfetti went in alone on Demko and roofed it, short-side, for the Jets third goal of the game. Jets fans will talking about that one for a while.
In the end, the Jets not only won the game, they also outshot Vancouver 27-24 and won 51.7 per cent of the faceoffs. Vancouver outhit Winnipeg 50-24 -- an amazing number of hits in one game. Kiefer Sherwood led the way for Vancouver with 10 of them. Adam Lowry had five hits for Winnipeg.
The Jets will now head out onto the road for three huge games away from the friendly confines of downtown Winnipeg. They play in L.A. on Tuesday, Las Vegas on Thursday and Salt Lake City on Saturday.
Game time Tuesday night from Los Angeles is 9:30 p.m. CDT.
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