Game 18: Winnipeg Jets vs Calgary Flames pre-game report

The Jets are not a happy bunch, as a rough road trip has taken the shine off their strong 9–3–0 start and sent them into a 1–4–0 spiral. They now sit in a wild card spot with a pack of teams closing in fast. There’s no time left to “figure things out” — they need answers immediately. While recently returned players like Adam Lowry, Cole Perfetti, and Dylan Samberg can be given some leeway, the rest of the roster needs to step up. Head coach Scott Arniel made that crystal clear following Friday’s practice.

One bright spot for the Jets has been their power play, which has scored three goals over the last two games and helped them climb from 13th to 11th in the NHL rankings. Their penalty kill, however, has slipped a bit, allowing more goals while short-handed and dropping them from a top-three position down to fifth overall.

Their opponent tonight boasts the league’s 32nd-ranked power play, converting on just 10.9% of opportunities—roughly half the success rate of Winnipeg’s units. Their penalty kill, however, is better than one might expect from a last-place Western Conference team, sitting 18th overall.

Based on how the Jets skated at practice there don’t appear to be any lineup questions as we learned that Morgan Barron and Cole Koepke, who both skated in regular jerseys yesterday, are not expected to be ready to play this evening.

Skate news:

Looks like only change which isn’t a surprise given yesterday’s practice is Colin Miller out for Luke Schenn.

Jets projected lines & D pairs:

Connor-Scheifele-Vilardi
Namestnikov-Toews-Perfetti
Niederreiter-Lowry-Iafallo
Pearson-Ford-Nyquist

Morrissey-DeMelo
Samberg-Pionk
Stanley-Schenn

Hellebuyck
Comrie

Flames projected lines & D pairs:

Huberdeau-Frost-Coronato
Kerins-Kadri-Farabee
Honzek-Backlund-Coleman
Lomberg-Zary-Klapka

Bahl-Andersson
Kuznetsov-Weegar
Bean-Pachal

Wolf
Cooley

This is how Calgary lined up when they faced San Jose in their last game. According to Pat Steinberg of the Fan 960 it’s how they looked at practice except Weegar took a maintenance day.

Players media availability:

To follow.

Coach media availability:

To follow.

Odds:

The Jets will face a Flames squad that sits last in the Western Conference with a steep goal differential, though Calgary did pick up a win in its most recent outing. Despite Winnipeg’s recent struggles, the matchup sets up as an opportunity—on paper at least—for the Jets to regain their footing. Now they’ll try to translate that edge into a result on the ice in order to end the trip on a positive note. For the latest Winnipeg Jets hockey odds, visit NHL betting site Betway.

Up Next:

Puck drop is at 9 M CDT. Be sure to head over to illegalcurve.com following the game for a recap of the action. You can join us on our YouTube channel for the Illegal Curve Post-Game Show around 11:40 PM CDT as we discuss and analyze the results of the game.