In Tempe, the Arizona Coyotes took a 2-0 lead in their first home game on Friday night, and ended up losing to the Winnipeg Jets, 3-2, in extra time.
Christian Fischer hit for a pair of goals in the Mullett Arena debut for the Coyotes.
“It was a tough way to end it,” Fischer said. “I thought we deserved better and [Vejmelka] deserved better. There was great energy from the crowd, you could feel it and we fed off it. But we had some penalties … their top guys started getting their touches and they started feeling good.”
It was another lost 2-0 lead in the NHL this season.
“At some point, we were squeezing the stick and we stopped making plays,” Coyotes coach Andre Tourigny said. “We were making plays at the beginning and then when we got the lead, we stopped making plays with the puck. We [made] a few turnovers and it put us on our heels.”
Blake Wheeler scored the game winner in the extra session off a breakaway with 32 seconds gone in the session.
“`Dubie’ made a great play at the blue line and they were caught with a few guys [back]. I just tried to catch him,” Wheeler said.
David Rittich made 19 saves in the Jets win.
“We again [got] down a couple of goals and just [kept] battling back and staying with it,” Jets associate coach Scott Arniel said. “We really took over that game in that second period and our whole bench felt good that we were going to pull that one off.”
Mark Scheifele and Cole Perfetti scored for the Jets to rally them back and force extra time.
“We stuck with it,” Wheeler said. “We played last night in L.A. and we knew those first periods [of a back to back] are always tough. `Ritter’ made some big saves back there for us to keep us in it, and if those games on a back to back are close or [you’re] down a goal, you have a chance to win. That was mission accomplished.”
Karel Vejmelka made 32 saves in the Coyotes loss.
You must be logged in to post a comment.