*Photo from Sportsnet*
Goals are up across the league. Not in this game. Morgan Barron scored, Connor Hellebuyck made every save, and the Winnipeg Jets defeated the San Jose Sharks with a 1-0 shutout victory on Wednesday night in Winnipeg.
After losing 5 straight games, the Jets won their second in a row by beating the Sharks in a game that turned into a duel of the goalies. The Sharks had the disadvantage of rust, playing in their first game of February due to the all star break and their bye week.
The game's only goal came in the opening period. At the 17:47 mark of the first period, Barron lit the lamp for the Jets, giving them a 1-0 lead on his 9th goal of the season, assisted by Neal Pionk and Dylan Samberg. After that, no one scored again, giving the Jets all they needed for a win.
Barron said of his goal that "I wasn’t sure if it hit me, but that one hit me. It kind of bounced off my glove and I saw it trickle in. We didn’t give up too much, and when we did, Hellebuyck was there to make the save. It was a tight checking game for the most part."
Hellebuyck was the starting goalie for the Jets and recorded his 3rd shutout of the season by stopping all 17 shots the Sharks got on net. Hellebuyck recorded the 35th shutout of his career and became the 10th goalie in NHL history to allow 3 goals or less in 30 consecutive games. His record is now 25-10-3 over 38 starts.
Jets head coach Rick Bowness said of Hellebuyck that "He didn’t have a lot of work, but he had some timely saves. Early in the third there, they had a couple of really good chances that he stopped. In the second period, their chances weren't very many, but they came in little bunches there, in a hurry, and he made big saves."
Getting the start in goal for the Sharks was Kaapo Kahkonen, who was a tough luck loser and fell to a 6-15-2 record. Kahkonen stopped all but one of the 39 shots he was tested with by the Jets, recording a stellar .974 save percentage. Unfortunately for him, he let in one more goal than his opponent.
Sharks head coach David Quinn said of the loss that "Obviously, we’ve been off for a while here. You could see there were a lot of missed opportunities for us to generate way more offense than we did. It looked like we tried to do the right thing, but we just weren’t. Our timing was off for sure, and obviously Kaapo played well, but we just weren’t efficient with the puck tonight."
The Sharks play the second half of a back to back against the Calgary Flames on Thursday night, with MacKenzie Blackwood set to get the start in net. The Jets don't play again until a Saturday tilt against the Vancouver Canucks, with Hellebuyck likely to start.
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