The Winnipeg Jets are not a very good hockey team at the moment.
Coming off a solid performance in a loss to Dallas Tuesday night, the Jets could not carry the momentum forward, making too many mistakes once again Thursday in a 6-3 loss to the visiting Boston Bruins to fall to 2-8-1 since Connor Hellebuyck went on injured reserve.
The Jets snapped several droughts, but special teams continue to be a major letdown. They allowed a pair of power play goals, and they had way too many defensive lapses in losing for the ninth time in their last eleven games.
“Two goals on penalty-kill, not good enough,” said a clearly disappointed Jets head coach Scott Arniel. “Until we go out, and on the ice, pay attention to the detail part of the game that way, those things are gonna happen. There was more grade-A’s given up tonight than we’ve given up in awhile. So, a little disappointing coming off what we had talked about after the Dallas game.”
David Pastrnak had a four-point effort with two goals and two assists. Strathclair Manitoba’s Morgan Geekie chipped in with three assists for the Bruins who won their fourth in a row.
The Jets ended a seven-game goalless stretch on the power play. Morgan Barron ended a 19-game goalless drought and Alex Iafallo snapped out of 12-game goalless funk. Gabriel Vilardi scored the only other goal for Winnipeg, but the team is just giving up way too many solid scoring chances.
“Tonight, special teams was a big part of it I think,” Barron said. “Especially on the PK (penalty kill) we got to be better. And then you give up a few grade-A’s. I think you look at the shot clock and whatever, all that stuff, but we’re giving up good chances and didn’t really give ourselves a good chance to kinda help Coms (Eric Comrie) out tonight.
“It’s kinda crunch time here right. It’s almost Christmas.”
The Jets outshot them 29-24.
With the loss, the Jets fall below the .500 mark with just a 14-15-1 record.
“We’re finding ways to lose games opposed to last year seemed like all these tight games we were coming out with the wins,” Vilardi said. “This year we’re kinda battling back in games. I think that’s a big factor, just battling back in all these games. It’s tough to come back from three goals down, two goals down every night.
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“Certain moments in the game, it seems like we’re making mistakes and we’re getting punished on every one of those mistakes.”
Hellebuyck continues to practice with the team, and his return can’t come soon enough.
“He’s a world-class player,” said Arniel. “Having him back is huge but at the end of the day, if we’re gonna give up those opportunities that we gave up tonight, he maybe makes those saves, but at the end of the day, those are too big of moments in key times where we gave them opportunities. So, we have to clean up our game no matter which goaltender is in there.”
Mark Scheifele saw his point-streak snapped at eight games.
Winnipeg got off to a solid start, opening the scoring just under six minutes in.
After a very ineffective power play, the fourth line came on and got the job done. Joonas Korpisalo coughed up a big rebound off a point shot from Josh Morrissey, and after a scramble in front, Barron poked it home for his first goal since Oct. 16, when he began the season with three goals in four games.
But instead of the Jets getting a jolt of life from the goal, what followed instead was a disastrous stretch of hockey that led to three Bruins goals.
After missing the past four games as a healthy scratch, Gustav Nyquist took a tripping penalty 1:26 after the Barron goal. Boston took advantage as Pastrnak beat Comrie with a wrist shot through a screen.
23 seconds after the goal, Barron was called for holding, and once again the Bruins took advantage on the power play. After Comrie turned aside a point shot from Hampus Lindholm, the rebound went to his right where Mason Lohrei was first to it. The Jets’ penalty killers all drifted to that side of the ice as Lohrei sent a cross-ice pass to a wide-open Casey Mittelstadt, who made no mistake to give Boston the lead.
It went from bad to worse for the Jets as Boston extended their lead 40 seconds later. Iafallo turned the puck over as he got crunched by a big hit in the neutral zone by Sean Kuraly. The Bruins turned the play up the ice and into the Winnipeg zone before Kuraly got the puck behind the Jets defence, deked out Comrie and roofed a backhand to make it 3-1.
Winnipeg cut the lead back to one 2:29 later. Dylan DeMelo, from his own end, sent a stretch pass to Iafallo at the Boston blue line. He took the puck and raced to the boards where he got the angle on Lohrei, driving wide before cutting back inside as he neared the goal line. He then drove the net before roofing it from a short angle for his fifth of the season.
The Jets got two more power play looks late in the period but were not able to generate much of anything as their special teams remain a big issue.
Winnipeg managed to outshoot the Bruins 13-7 in a first period where only 11:53 was played at 5-on-5.
Kuraly had a great chance to restore Boston’s two-goal lead when he was left all alone in front of Comrie about six and a half minutes into the period. Comrie came up large, making a point-blank save to keep it a 3-2 game.
But with 5:24 to go in the middle frame, the Bruins were able to break through.
The play began with a weak shot on goal from Pastrnak along the half-wall. Comrie stopped it but the ensuing rebound was not well handled by the Jets in front of him. Pastrnak got another slow shot on goal that was also stopped before the puck leaked back to the point where Hampus Lindholm stepped into a slapshot that beat Comrie clean on his blocker side.
With just over two minutes left in the period, the Jets got their fourth power play look of the game and made quick work of it. The Jets got possession off the faceoff, leading to Kyle Connor sending the puck down low to Cole Perfetti. He drove the net and had his shot turned aside but Gabriel Vilardi banged home the rebound for his 14th of the season, Winnipeg’s first power play goal since Nov. 26.
Shots on goal in the second were 11-9 Winnipeg.
Boston held onto their one-goal lead as the clock ticked through a tight-checking third period before extending the lead with 5:17 left as Elias Lindholm added an insurance marker
Desperate to make a late push, the Jets pulled Comrie for an extra attacker with more than three minutes remaining, but it didn’t work as Pastrnak scored into the empty net with 1:56 left to seal it.
Comrie turned aside 18 shots in defeat while Korpisalo stopped 26 shots for the win.
Winnipeg will try to get back in the win column Saturday night when they host the Washington Capitals. Pregame coverage on 680 CJOB begins at 4 p.m. with the puck dropping just after 6 p.m.
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