In Winnipeg, the Jets’ offense came to life on Friday night in a 6-2 win over the Detroit Red Wings.
The Jets scored three in the first period to take control of the game.
“Tonight is obviously more of an example for how we want to play,” Winnipeg coach Rick Bowness said. “We played really well and we scored some goals, that’s really the biggest difference. That’s how we want to play.”
They added two in the middle frame, and one in the third to take 6-0 lad in the game.
Connor Hellebuyck made 23 saves in the win, he lost a shutout bid when the Red Wings scored twice midway through the third period.
The Jets improved to 42-31-3.
Kyle Connor got the Jets offense rolling when he staked them to an early 1-0 advantage.
Blake Wheeler scored for a 2-0 lead, and Mark Scheifele hit for his 39th of the season for a 3-0 lead after the first period.
“We had a good forecheck, I think that was the biggest thing,” Scheifele said. “We made some plays, we held onto the puck, made them work in the D-zone. And when we do that, we’re a pretty hard team to play against.”
Detroit dropped to 33-33-9, and failed to build on a 3-2 win over the Carolina Hurricanes on Thursday night.
“The puck had to go in for us,” Bowness said. “You need some breaks. Look at Mark’s goal, all of a sudden he’s coming around the net, he knocks it in. It’s there. We haven’t had those breaks in a long time. Even that first goal, the tip. We haven’t had that luck around the net in a long time and it was good to see.”
In the middle frame, Dylan DeMelo ballooned the lad to 4-0 at at 1:20.
Nino Niederreiter struck at 13:42 for a 5-0 lead after two periods.
It got worse in the third when Nikolaj Ehlers scored at 5:07 of the third for a 6-0 lead.
“We’ve got six games to go and every single one is a huge one,” Jets forward Nikolaj Ehlers said. “So we enjoy this one for tonight and then we move on to the next one.”
Detroit scored twice in a 21 second span to end the shutout bid.
“I really think it was just one of those games where we needed something to energize us,” Detroit coach Derek Lalonde said. “We couldn’t build any momentum throughout the night. I do appreciate the fact that we won the third period. We kind of battled and hung in there.”
David Perron and Joe Valeno scored at 10:41 and 11:02, respectively, for the 6-2 fina.
Magnus Hellberg made 23 saves in the loss, and was left to hang out and dry most of the night.
“I think we had a tough start, but I don’t think I showed up to help the team win today,” Hellberg said. “I take full responsibility for my performance tonight. It was clearly not good enough. I’m not happy with how I played.”
No blame was put on Hellberg .
“As a backup, it’s hard. It’s a tough position,” Lalonde said. “It was just one of those nights he couldn’t find the puck and he kept losing his net. I thought he battled through it and it’s just tough. There’s going to be some of those nights. Obviously we weren’t great in front of him, and I just think it kind of piled up on him.”
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