The day began with the Jets reducing the training camp roster from 35 to 32, two players (Chaz Lucius and Wyatt Bongiovanni) were sent to the AHL and one player (Colby Barlow) went back to the OHL.
An already busy schedule is going to be even busier as Manitoba got their training camp underway today with a roster of 27 players so it was the Jets on one sheet of ice and the Moose on another at the hockey for all centre which got underway at 10 AM for both clubs. (Our Moose day 1 recap is here).
While watching the Jets skate, centre Mark Scheifele spoke to coach Rick Bowness and then he left the ice. We didn’t see anything happen to him but he left for the room.
Turned out that both he and Morgan Barron are dealing with an illness, likely the same one that kept Kyle Connor and Gabe Vilardi out of the game this evening in Calgary. The Jets bench boss indicated that prospect Brad Lambert and Dominic Toninato (provided he cleared waivers) would go to Calgary and play tonight.
He also said the team would take an extra forward and defenceman given they “don’t know what we’re gonna look like when we get off that plane”.
In addition to the health news provided above the Jets bench boss also indicated that Nikolaj Ehlers, who didn’t skate today, “took the day off because he’s still not feeling 100%”. He also indicated that the dynamic winger “doesn’t look like he’s going to be able to play on Thursday”.
When the clock struck 1 PM CDT we learned the fate of the five players Winnipeg had placed on waivers on Sunday. Jansen Harkins was claimed by the Penguins while the other four (Dominic Toninato, Jeff Malott, Kristian Reichel & Ashton Sautner) all cleared waivers and could have been assigned to the Moose. However, because of the uncertainty the Jets kept up Toninato, Malott and Sautner (in addition to recalling Lambert).
When the Jets made that announcement they also advised that they had assigned prospects Elias Salomonsson and Danny Zhilkin, who had been dealing with injuries, to the Moose.
And the assignment of Salomonsson to the AHL might turn out to be the most interesting move of the day. My presumption was because he’s not a first rounder he’d be heading back to Skelleftea when he was feeling healthy due to NHL/SHF Transfer Agreement. (Basically the Swedish Hockey Federation wants players to play in Sweden if they are not in the NHL and if you’re not a first rounder then you are supposed to be returned to the Swedish club you’re signed with). Perhaps the Jets and Skelleftea have an agreement. Will find out more tomorrow.
When the puck dropped in Calgary at 8 PM CDT the Jets began the contest with a pair of minor penalties which allowed David Gustafsson to display his penalty killing skills. Once Winnipeg started to push back into the Flames end they opened the scoring courtesy of a pair of first rounders in Cole Perfetti (2020) seeing Ville Heinola (2019) well before 14 got open, drew the Flames to him and then Heinola let it fly to open the scoring. About eight minutes later Dominic Toninato, who could have been wearing antlers today, used the opportunity before him to be in a Jets jersey to make it 2-0 for Winnipeg.
Two names we’ve been hearing quite a bit made quite a bit of noise in this game as leading points getter in the pre-season Parker Ford (yes you read that right) and David Gustafsson kept making their case to stick with the Jets with the two combining for the third Winnipeg goal. About nine minutes later the two linked up again this time to tie the game for Winnipeg.
It appeared to be a somewhat defence optional hockey game in Calgary which one might suspect won’t leave head coach Rick Bowness too pleased with his squad. The Flames would take it 5-4 dropping the Jets pre-season record to 2-2-1.
And if you’re curious what the advanced stats said about the game here is the GameScore impact card:
#NHL GameScore Impact Card for Winnipeg Jets on 2023-10-02:#GoJetsGo #NHLJets pic.twitter.com/O4diWJVHig
— HockeyStatCards (@hockeystatcards) October 3, 2023
The Jets are off on Tuesday.
