Game 54: Winnipeg Jets vs Florida Panthers pre-game report

There won’t be a morning skate but it appears the tip off for line changes came yesterday at practice as per Ken Wiebe of the Winnipeg Free Press who was in attendance and reported that it looks to him like Gustav Nyquist will return after being a healthy scratch. There were also some tweaks to the lines which the bench boss cagily said was done in anticipation of some things he expects the Panthers to throw at them.

Speaking of the team from south Florida they’ve lost two straight and sit well below the second wild card spot. They are eight points back of Boston although they do have two games in hand. They score more often then the visitors but also give up more goals. Their power play ranks 22nd in the NHL while the penalty kill sits in 8th overall.

Skate news:

No morning skate.

Warm-up news:

As per Ken Wiebe it will be Eric Comrie in net.

Jets projected lines & D pairs:

Connor-Scheifele-Iafallo
Perfetti-Lowry-Vilardi
Niederreiter-Toews-Namestnikov
Koepke-Barron-Nyquist

Morrissey-DeMelo
Samberg-Salomonsson
Stanley-Schenn

Comrie

Panthers projected lines & D pairs:

Luostarinen – Rodrigues – Reinhart
Verhaeghe – Bennett – Tkachuk
Samoskevich – Schwindt – Greer
Vilmanis – Boqvist – Kunin

Forsling – Ekblad
Mikkola – Balinskis
Bjornfot – Petry

Bobrovsky

As per Jameson Olive who works for Florida.

Odds:

The outlook tilts slightly toward Florida, reflecting a team expected to dictate much of the play. Winnipeg has shown it can stay within striking distance, but the gap in form suggests the Jets may need to be sharper than usual to flip the script. This one reads as competitive, though the balance of expectation sits with the Panthers. For the latest Winnipeg Jets hockey odds, visit NHL betting site Betway.

Up Next:

Puck drop is at 3 PM CST. 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 5:40 PM CST as we discuss and analyze the results of the game.