*Photo from The Globe and Mail*
It was a game that the Winnipeg Jets absolutely needed to have, and they got it done. Mark Scheifele scored, Neal Pionk scored, and the Jets shut out the Vegas Golden Knights with a 4-0 win on Tuesday night in Winnipeg.
With the Jets playoff hopes in serious jeopardy last week, the Jets have woken up and have now rattled off 6 wins in their last 8 games. They are now 3 points back of the second wild card spot in the tightly contested western conference, which is held by the Dallas Stars. In between Dallas and Winnipeg? Oh yeah, it's Vegas.
Jets interim head coach Dave Lowry said that "We played a team that showed a lot of urgency to start and our goalie was our best player. I didn't like our first period, no. I liked our goalie's first period. He gave us an opportunity to settle in and get going."
After the first period went scoreless, Pierre-Luc Dubois got the Jets scoring going, tallying his 25th goal of the season 6:16 into the second period, a power play goal to make it 1-0 Jets. At the 15:14 mark of the second, Scheifele scored his 24th goal of the season to make it 2-0 Jets, assisted by Dylan DeMelo and Nikolaj Ehlers.
It took 11:06 into the 3rd to get another goal, when Pionk scored his 3rd goal of the season, putting the Jets up 3-0 with assists from Paul Stastny and Kyle Connor. 13:51 into the 3rd was when Ehlers put the exclamation point on the 4-0 win, scoring his 19th goal of the season, assisted by Scheifele and Blake Wheeler.
Getting the start for the Jets was Connor Hellebuyck, who put together a beauty of a shutout. Hellebuyck stopped all 42 shots from Vegas that came his way, with the perfect 1.000 save percentage. It's the 28th shutout of his career, and his record improves to 23-22-9 in 54 starts on the season.
After the game, Hellebuyck said of his latest shutout that "It was one of those nights that they just hit you. I could tell early on when the puck was just going my way, bounces were going my way, tips were going my way, posts were going my way. It was just one of those nights."
On the other side of the ice, Vegas was shut out for the second game in a row, with rookie Logan Thompson taking the fall this time. Thompson turned aside 22 of the 26 shots on goal he faced from the Jets, posting a .846 save percentage in another loss. Thompson's record on the season dropped to a 3-4-0 mark with the loss.
Golden Knights forward Jonathan Marchessault said that "Thompson is definitely not the problem. He's giving us lots of chances to win every night. He's been great, honestly, for us and he's working hard. It's disappointing to not get one in the past two games for him."
Both teams get back in action with Thursday night home games. The Jets welcome the Ottawa Senators to town, with Hellebuyck to get the start once again. The Golden Knights host the Predators, with Laurent Brossoit the likely starter.
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