Nashville Facing Elimination After 6-2 Loss to the Jets

The Winnipeg Jets hit the ice last night on a simple mission, win game 5, and for Winnipeg’s Blake Wheeler and rookie Kyle Connor, they did their part and helped lead the Jets to a 6-2 win over the Predators.

For Blake Wheeler, the move made by Connor in the first period sent notice that tonight was going to be his night, and Paul Maurice, head coach of the Jets got the same signal. Connor did his part and exceeded expectations scoring not one, but two goals last night, one of those being his first in the playoffs.

The result has Winnipeg leading the series 3-2 and one away from advancing to the finals.

Commenting on Connor, Wheeler stated,

” “A young player used to putting the puck in net … when it doesn’t happen right away, especially in your first taste of playoff action, it can be tough to stay with it. But his confidence hasn’t wavered a bit.

When asked about the series, Connor said,

“I don’t lose sleep. The bottom line is team success. If the team is winning, everybody’s happy.”

Connor had been moved to the second line joining Patrik Laine and Paul Stastny after the Jets lost Game 4. However, Maurice chose to join Wheeler, Scheifele and Connor once again together, and it seems his plan went exactly as he hoped with the trio earning eight points collectively last night.

While discussing the move made by Connor in the first period at the blue line, Maurice said,

“He plays at a certain rate, a certain cadence. When there’s nerves, there’s not as much of that. I think he kind of pushed through it on that play.”

He continued commenting lamenting that he felt the move set Connor up for the rest of the game adding,

“You can play not to make mistakes, that’s fine, we all want to play smart hockey. But those kind of players, your really highly skilled guys, have to have a certain amount of confidence in their game.

Also scoring for Winnipeg was Paul Stastny and Mathieu Perreault each scoring one, and Dustin Byfuglien and Mark Scheifele both scored with each earning an assist. Nikolaj Ehlers had two assists, and Connor Hellebuyck had a busy first period, and 38 saves for the night.

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Nashville’s Ryan Johansen and Yannick Weber each scored and Pekka Rinne made 20 saves before being replaced by Juuse Saros, who had five saves.

Speaking post-game, P.K Subban said,

“It just seemed like every time we made a mistake it ended up in our net.”

The series now returns to Winnipeg for Game 6, and the Jets will be hoping to wrap up the series with a win at home. If the Nashville Predators succeed in winning Game 6, the series will return to Nashville for Game 7.

The game went scoreless in the first period, and it seemed like the second period would be as well until at 7:43 Statsny was out front of the net and scored his fourth of the series. This set off an explosion of action that saw six goals in 10 minutes of play.

Nashville came back to tie up the game at 11:08 when Yannick Weber sent the puck past the glove of Hellebuyck. Less than two minutes later, Kyle Connor sent a loose puck making it 2-1, and Byfuglien made it 3-1 just over 3 minutes later to earn his fourth goal of the series. Connor earned his second of the night with just less than 3 minutes left to go in the third to give the Jets a 4-1 lead.

The third period saw Winnipeg on a power play only to see a turnaround by Nashville that ended with a short-handed goal to make it 4-2. However, Winnipeg’s Mark Scheifele responded and earned his ninth after being set up by Connor making it 5-2. Mathieu Perreault then added another for the night at 6:23 in the third and putting an end to the Predators hopes of taking the lead in the series.