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Game #1: Winnipeg Jets vs St. Louis Blues

Far More Raw Talent Than Meets the Eye

By Marjorie RodenPublished 5 years ago 4 min read
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Jack Roslovic steals the puck from Blues' goaltender  Jake Allen, setting up a potential goal by Nikolaj Ehlers

Through looking at the simple statistics during the season opening game for the Winnipeg Jets in this 2018-2019 season, the win was very decisive. The game saw five different goal scorers on the stats sheet for the Jets in Patrik Laine (power play goal), Adam Lowry (short handed goal), Blake Wheeler, Kyle Connor, and Brandon Tanev, with goaltender Connor Hellebuyck playing a nearly perfect game, only allowing one goal, keeping the other 41 shots out. However, as is the case with any hockey game, there’s far more to look at than just the final score.

At the 2:20 mark of the first, Kristian Vesalainen showed his ability to set up a play beautifully by passing the puck off to linemate Nikolaj Ehlers, who put in a great effort which saw goaltender Jake Allen make a good toe save. Jacob Trouba was right on the doorstep, and had the puck not been covered in a sprawling save by Allen, the game’s scoring could have easily been opened by the offensive defenseman Trouba with assists by Ehlers and Vesalainen.

Certainly, the rest of the league recognized the offensive power that comes with Mark Schiefele. At 3:22 of the first, the Blues’ Jay Bouwmeester hooked up Schiefele’s stick when he was near the net and in an excellent scoring position to tuck the puck in. Of course, the Blues’ effort to stop the Jets from scoring wound up shooting them in the foot as that was the play which led to Laine’s power play goal, set up by Schiefele.

At 11:55 of the opening period, off a great setup by Jack Roslovic, Ehlers nearly made it a 2-0 game for the visitors as goaltender Allen was not in position. Instead, Bouwmeester blocked the quick shot. Also, at the 13:12 mark of the first, the tandem of Laine, Perreault, and Little came very close by storming in on the Blues’ netminder.

30 seconds into the second period, Kyle Connor came painfully close to scoring his first goal of the game, but a crossbar got in the way. Much later, at 15:04, Connor almost squeaked one in past the sprawling Allen, but the goaltender managed to get in front, as the puck bounced off the upper part of his stickhand arm.

With just under a minute and a half left in the second period, and while the Jets’ Myers in the sin bin for a delay of game call, it looked like the Blues might have had a chance to tie the game up, especially with Hellebuyck losing his stick in the maylay on the net. However, he kept his composure and along with his defenders, the puck stayed out.

More penalties came to the Jets in the final period. During one of their shorthanded situations, after making a maylay of saves on the Blues’ shooters, Adam Lowry managed to catch an errant blue-line pass from the Blues’ Alexander Steen and sped in one-on-one on goaltender Allen, popping the puck in vis the five-hole and putting the visitors up by 2 at 5:50.

And then, a burst of goals came for the Jets. Just after stepping out of the penalty box, Connor set up Jets’ captain Blake Wheeler with a lovely pass at 6:55, putting the puck in just past the glovehand of Allen. At 7:35, less than a minute later, a powerful point shot by defenseman Trouba was tipped in by Connor.

11:05 saw a goal being scored by Brandon Tanev, which had to be reviewed as the puck, while in mid-air, did cross the line but forward Robert Thomas batted it out of the wide open cage. The play was stopped, and once the video review was made, the Jets’ Tanev was credited with his first goal of the season.

Hellebuyck’s try at earning his first goose egg of the season was, unfortunately, crushed by the squeaker shot by the Blues’ Vince Dunn, which went just under his glovehand arm, but even so, the Jets came away with their first victory of the season.

“I was feeling it tonight,” Hellebuyck said after the game, adding, “I was playing well, I was moving well, but that being said, I think it’s the guys in front of me keeping it to the outside and allowing me to see shots.”

On his short handed goal, Lowry said, “When you haven’t scored in a while, you get a lot of energy when you get some chances. That one, I felt pretty good, so I was happy to see that one go in.”

FINAL THOUGHTS: The scoring could have been a lot more lopsided in favour of the Jets given the chances they had early on in the game, and though only 5 names were credited with a single goal each, there could have easily been more had the bounces gone their way and had the goalpost not been an obstruction. Had some of the shots even gone a half inch lower, they could have found the twine. The same goes with the speed of some of the shots by the Jets’ offense, but the final score was one in favour of the visitors. Also, the setups being created by Vesalainen were showing a lot of great ice vision. Though not as flashy as some of the other players, he was plugging away, being a very hard worker on the ice.

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About the Creator

Marjorie Roden

I make dramatic and documentary films, and have been known from time to time act and create visual art. And I also love hockey, hence why I write about it a lot! I also work professionally as a freelance writer and photographer in Canada!

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