Feisty Jets fall in OT Winless skid stretches to four after Hyman scores in extra-time for Oilers By: Mike McIntyre Posted: 10:43 PM CDT Tuesday, Mar. 26, 2024 Last Modified: 6:39 AM CDT Wednesday, Mar. 27, 2024 Updates

The Winnipeg Jets showed plenty of moxie as they fought back to force overtime Tuesday night against the Edmonton Oilers. But a lack of finish, along with some foolish decisions, proved costly in a 4-3 loss in front of a full house at Canada Life Centre.

Zach Hyman continued his career year by scoring the winner just 82 seconds into the three-on-three session.

“There’s a lot of fight in there. We just have to stop beating ourselves,” said coach Rick Bowness. “I think just look at the first two periods. The first period shows you how good we can be and then the second period just shows you how bad we are when we get away from the way we’re supposed to play. Yeah, we got it back in the third. So it was kind of like that. That’s how I assess it then. The first was great. The second was terrible. And the third was even.”

Leon Draisaitl, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and Connor Brown had the regulation goals for the Oilers, who snapped a two-game losing streak and improved to 43-23-4.

Mason Appleton opened the scoring for the Jets, while Brenden Dillon and Sean Monahan tallied exactly one minute apart midway through the final frame to erase a 3-1 deficit.

Winnipeg is now 44-22-6 on the season, but just 0-3-1 in the last four.

“Frustrating that we can’t get the second point,” said Dillon. “When we’re carrying play and when we’re able to be right up there with the best teams in the league. We’ve shown this year that it’s black and white to us, and we talk about it as a team when we bring it. I think it’s just if we can get to that full 60, 65 some nights, full-minute effort,  we’re going to be happy with it. We’ve only got so many games left, but I think (Tuesday) was definitely a step in the right direction.”

Jets vs Oilers never seems to disappointment dating all the way back to some Smythe Division classics, and the latest meeting had a little bit of everything. Here’s a detailed breakdown of what went down.

1) Feisty foes — There was plenty of bite to this one, which probably isn’t surprising since both teams came into play looking to snap losing streaks.

First up was Jets defenceman Logan Stanley, inserted into the lineup in place of Dylan Samberg, who dropped the gloves with Corey Perry early in the first.

Give the decision to the younger, bigger Stanley, who then gave Evander Kane a shove on the way to the penalty box and got the crowd riled up by throwing his arms in the air.

The second bout happened in the second period, with Brenden Dillon crushing Perry into the Jets bench, which drew the ire of Oilers defenceman Darnell Nurse. He challenged Dillon to a duel, and the two had a spirited tilt.

“I think both those fights come from us engaging, us being physical and a team having to react to us,” said Dillon. “It kind of shows when we’re in the game, when we’re involved like that. And I think that’s the Winnipeg Jet identity when we’re playing hard, physical, forechecking, you know, when our side of the ice isn’t easy to get into. It’s just a part of my game and trying to finish checks and, you know, I thought Stan did a great job.”

2) Squeezing the sticks — Consistent scoring has been difficult to come by lately, and Tuesday’s game essentially picked up where Sunday’s 3-0 loss in Washington left off.

Tons of early chances. Nothing to show for it.

Oilers goaltender Stuart Skinner was the star of the opening period, making numerous high-quality saves to keep it tied 0-0.

Nikolaj Ehlers and Mark Scheifele were both robbed by Skinner in the first 20 minutes, while Sean Monahan rang a shot off the crossbar as well.

Ehlers had another great chance early in the middle frame, getting a breakaway only to send his shot wide.

Winnipeg finally broke through when Kyle Connor’s initial shot was stopped by Skinner, but Appleton buried the ensuing rebound for his 14th of the year at 4:43.

That gave the Jets the lead, but they quickly returned to their snakebitten ways and were unable to build off it.

Cole Perfetti set himself up for a dangerous shot following a nifty toe-drag, and then Nino Niederreiter was left all alone in front only to have his deke attempt just go wide.

You had the feeling all those missed opportunities would come back to bite the home team.

3) Oilers strike twice — With his team trailing and more than half the game already in the books, Oilers coach Kris Knoblauch hit the “in case of emergency” button and reunited the dynamic duo of Connor McDavid and Draisaitl, who began the night on separate lines.

It paid off, as it so often does.

Draisaitl scored his 38th of the season at 11:46 to tie it up, finishing up a nice passing sequence with McDavid and Warren Foegele.

Edmonton took its first lead just 1:43 later as Connor Brown ripped a shot past Connor Hellebuyck for just his third goal of the year. The Jets were in the process of a line change and ended up getting caught on the wrong end of an odd-man rush.

“We showed in the first period how good we can be and in the second were a little sloppy,” said Niederreiter. “Definitely had a couple great looks (early in the game) and wish we could have put one. It’s the way it’s going right now. Just gotta stay with it, stay positive and go from there.”

Winnipeg was outshot 19-4 in the second period. In some ways, they were lucky to escape only down one goal given how poorly they played.

“It wasn’t just a moment. It was terrible puck management at their blue line and a couple of really bad changes that cost us the goals,” said Bowness. “So that’s self-inflicted. It’s not just one moment, it was too many. That’s creating your own problems. That’s all that is.”

4) No power to the play — Get well soon, Gabe Vilardi. Winnipeg’s power play has taken a noticeable nose-dive since Vilardi exited the lineup with injury 14 games ago.

That was certainly on display in this one, where the Jets had three chances with the man advantage in the first two periods — and came up empty.

The most egregious was a four-minute thanks to a Brown high-stick on Dylan DeMelo drew blood. Winnipeg could barely get set up for any sustained zone time, and they managed a grand total of zero shots.

“We had a hard time getting into the zone and establishing something,” said Niederreiter. “At the end of the day, we didn’t do a good enough job of being too dangerous on the PP.”

With the Jets down a goal early in the third period, Ehlers caught Nurse in the chin area with an errant stick that drew blood, and you could sense that was about to happen.

Sure enough, Edmonton’s potent power play made Winnipeg pay, as Nugent-Hopkins scored his 17th of the year just 27 seconds into the four-minute advantage.

“It’s another night our speciality teams cost us the game. We gave up another power play goal against and our power play didn’t do anything,” said Bowness. “We didn’t support the puck quick enough. Too much one-on-one and not making the next play. When you’re under pressure, you’ve got to be able to make that next play. And we weren’t making it. That’s what it comes down to. You need to work hard, you need support on the puck but when you get it, you’ve got to be able to make that next play and we weren’t making it because we didn’t handle the puck well enough.”

McDavid drew his second assist of the night, and his 93rd of the season. He’s very likely going to hit the century mark.

5) Jets go bang bang— Just when it looked like Winnipeg was on its way to a fourth straight regulation loss, which would have been the longest of the year, Dillon gave them some life when his point shot eluded Skinner.

The veteran blue-liner, a pending unrestricted free agent this summer, is up to eight goals this year which ties Josh Morrissey for most among Winnipeg defencemen and is a career-high.

“Just rip it,” he said of his mindset. “(Associate coach Scott Arniel) has been really stressing with us as defence to take some more slappers, get it towards the net. I mean, teams are so good at blocking shots these days. And, we’ve got a big group that when we go to the net, we tell these guys to practice. It’s tough to move you. So, just trying to get it on that there, and obviously happy to get it in.”

With Jets fans still buzzing about that one, Monahan came through with a terrific tip off an Ehlers shot to tie the game.  He’s now up to 22 goals, including nine with the Jets since being acquired in a pre-deadline trade from the Montreal Canadiens. Defenceman Neal Pionk had secondary assists on both third period goals.

Winnipeg caught a lucky break with 2:06 left in regulation when Nugent-Hopkins was called for high-sticking Adam Lowry. Replays showed it was actually Dylan DeMelo’s stick that hit his teammate. The Oilers were irate, but to their credit they didn’t let the bad call make a difference by killing it off, setting the stage for overtime.

6) The bitter end – The Jets had a chance at one end, but a poor play by Connor in the offensive zone quickly turned it around, allowing Nugent-Hopkins to set up Hyman for his 51st of the year.

It was a just result based on the flow of play and the shot clock, which read 42-25 in favour of the Oilers.

The Jets remain in third place in the Central Division with 10 regular-season games remaining, but are now just four points ahead of Nashville who are 16-0-2 in their last 18 games to occupy the top wildcard spot in the Western Conference.

The Predators were down 4-1 in the third period on Tuesday night against the Vegas Golden Knights, but stormed back for a 5-4 overtime victory.

Next up for Winnipeg is that very same Vegas club on Thursday night.

“I think just a little bit more consistency,” Dillon said of what’s required in the final 10 games of the season.

“It’s not like we’re playing any easy teams here over these last 10. You know, it’s teams that are fighting to get playoff spots or for home ice. I thought especially (Tuesday), it was a good effort by us, but at the end of the day, we need to get two points out of them. We just continue to prove to ourselves throughout this year, through now 72 games, when we’re on our game, when we’re playing the way that we talk about Winnipeg Jet hockey, we’re an elite team. But we’re not doing that when we’re trying to be fancy or letting our foot off the gas.”