ST.PAUL, MN – It was a must win game Friday afternoon in Minnesota for the Winnipeg Jets after losing two straight and seeing themselves falling behind in the wild card race in the very tough Western Conference; they needed a huge game and they got one in front of 19,055 fans at the Xcel Energy Center. It was a 3-1 Jets win to give them their third win in their last 7 games.
The Jets were welcoming the debut of highly touted goalie of the future Connor Hellebuyck who was called up from the Manitoba Moose to replace the injured Ondrej Pavelec. The Jets played a strong defensive game and only allowed 15 shots and Hellebuyck stopped 14 of them to get his first NHL win.
“Once I got on the ice I got comfortable, because it’s just another game of hockey,” Hellebuyck, 22, said. “Huge milestone, but the way you’ve got to look at it is just another game.”
These two teams always play tight entertaining games as they have developed quite the rivalry against one another. Always fun in the crowd as well, as numerous fans from either city make the trip to follow their team. This game started off with a bang early as the Wilds Kurtis Gabriel and the Jets Anthony Peluso dropped the mitts for a heavy weight tilt that Peluso took in a decision.
“This game was important because of how it was played, not the result. It was played in a way that you can say, ‘That’s our game, that’s the game that we can have some confidence in,’ so the result is almost secondary,” Jets coach Paul Maurice said. “If that game hadn’t turned out that way, but we had played that well, we’d be trying to play the same game tomorrow night.”
Later in the period the hatred continued as Mark Stuart of the Jets and Ryan Carter of the Wild dropped the mitts as well.
The Jets got back to their strong checking fast skating game and also got a power play goal that helped out in this win.
Winnipeg got goals from Mathieu Perreault, Dustin Byfuglien and Nikolaj Ehlers .
Ryan Carter scored the lone Wild goal his third of the season.
Winnipeg controlled most of the game although they had some break downs they were not as costly as they have been in this recent slide the Jets have been on, they had the puck more than the Wild in the afternoon battle.
Devan Dubnyk took the loss for the Wild as he allowed three goals on 29 shots.
“I think our record might be a little misleading,” Wild coach Mike Yeo said. “There was a lot of inconsistencies in our game, and early in the year I think you get away with that stuff; you show the video and maybe it gets a little bit better. But when you’re winning games, I don’t think those things sink in.
“I think we’re playing the same game that we were at the start of the year, but the League gets better and we’re not getting away with those things. This is maybe a good kick in the [rear].”
The Jets will travel to Colorado for another huge division battle on Saturday night.
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