Game 19 vs San Jose: Pavelec and Entries

10 years ago

An impressive performance by the Jets on Sunday night saw them win their second game in a row for the first time since the beginning of the season, and hopes are high right now that a little consistency could be growing. Aside from the game in Chicago, the Jets had a pretty solid week finishing 3-1-0, and if they can continue to put in performances like the one they had against a good team in San Jose, this team may not be done yet.

Zone Entries

5 vs 5	Player	# of successful entries	Shots (From Entries)	Shots/Entry	Controlled Entries	Shots (Controlled Entries)	% With Control	Failed entries
2	Pardy	3	3	1.00	0	0	0%	1
7	Ellerby	0	0	N/A	0	0	N/A	0
9	Kane	5	2	0.40	4	2	80%	1
12	Jokinen	8	5	0.63	6	5	75%	0
15	Halischuk	6	2	0.33	3	1	50%	0
16	Ladd	8	4	0.50	3	2	38%	1
17	Wright	2	0	0.00	0	0	0%	0
18	Little	1	1	1.00	0	0	0%	0
22	Thorburn	2	2	1.00	1	2	50%	0
24	Clitsome	2	0	0.00	0	0	0%	0
26	Wheeler	4	2	0.50	3	2	75%	0
27	Tangradi	1	0	0.00	1	0	100%	0
33	Byfuglien	1	0	0.00	0	0	0%	0
39	Enstrom	3	0	0.00	2	0	67%	0
40	Setoguchi	2	2	1.00	2	2	100%	0
44	Bogosian	4	5	1.25	2	4	50%	0
55	Scheifele	4	4	1.00	3	4	75%	0
67	Frolik	3	1	0.33	1	1	33%	0
	TEAM	59	33	0.56	31	25	53%	3
	OPP	63	28	0.44	27	15	43%	5
	OZF	17	9	0.53
	DZF	10	3	0.30

Observations

The Jets dominance all began in their ability to control the neutral zone and prevent clean Shark entries for the majority of the night. This resulted in the higher total number of entries from the Sharks, but fewer with control and thus fewer shots generated. This means the Sharks were (for the most part) forced to dump the puck to enter the Jets zone, and the Jets followed that up by generally clearing the zone. This is how good puck possession teams generally play, as it often results in more controlled zonetime, more goals for and less goals against.
For the first time in quite a while we saw Zach Bogosian join in on the offensive rush Sunday night. As he is growing more comfort with Enstrom, and learning how well Toby can cover and make up for mistakes on the occasional rush, I hope to see this occur more often. The Jets need to continue to see increased production from their back end. When that happens, the Jets play better.
Olli Jokinen continued to play at a much higher level than we’ve seen out of him before. He did a great job in controlling the vast majority of his entries, and generated plenty of shots. His line mates in Kane and Setoguchi did a good job as well, as that second line continues to impress.
The third line was a bit of an anomaly on this topic. They had a pretty good game entry wise and even managed a goal, yet were pretty badly out-chanced (as you’ll see in my scoring chance post). This is a perfect example as to why you can’t use a single metric to evaluate performance.
The Ladd – Little – Wheeler line has its legs going again. Little and Ladd have been great together for the majority of the season, but it was nice to see Wheeler back to usual self. He was flying all over the ice Sunday night, and was really enjoyable to watch.
You know it’s a good game wen Chris Thorburn had more controlled entries than he did failed entries. Congrats for actually contributing a little bit Chris.

Pavelec Performance

Following a quick 2 goals on 4 shots start, I was all but ready to rip into Pavelec after one period. Although I could argue that he got beat clean a lot in this game, he did make a couple big saves and had a decent game overall. The Sharks didn’t exactly pepper him with shots, but he did have a fair share of near- and complete breakaways to deal with on the night. He also managed to stop all three shooters in the shoot out, the clincher of course being stopped via his signature “laying on my stomach” move.

Goal	Situation	Why It Went In	Where It Went
1	Penalty Kill	Traffic In Front	Blocker
2	Breakaway	Beat Clean	Five Hole
3	Breakaway	Beat Clean	Glove
4	Penalty Kill	Beat Clean	Open Net

Quick Explanations

Of all the goals against, this one did bother me the most. There was lots of traffic in front, but this was a time where the Jets needed a save. Pavelec didn’t really seem to have trouble seeing the puck (he made a pretty clear attempt at stopping it) and just got beat.

A poor choice by Byfuglien here resulted in the young Hertl getting a clear breakaway. Again, I really hate how Pavelec always ends up on his stomach when he tried to stop breakaways but I can’t really put any blame on him for this.

A poor attempt to stand strong at the blue line by Tobias Enstrom resulted in Tommy Wingels having a partial breakaway on Pavelec. I think Pavelec would have been better off had he not crouched down and made himself incredibly small, but again, hard to fault a goaltender on a breakaway.

This was just a fantastic power play by the Sharks. The Jets could really learn a thing or two from this unit. Regardless, Pavelec tracked that incredible pass from Couture rather horribly, resulting in Dan Boyle having a completely empty net to put the puck into.

Things to Watch For

The Jets go into Detroit Tuesday night for their second matchup against the Wings in just over a week. Detroit is likely going to want to answer back following a game they were greatly outplayed in last week, but it provides the Jets with an opportunity to string together a three game win streak for the first time this season. Here are some things to watch for heading into Detroit:

Are these Jets who we thought they were? The Jets play was much improved for three out of the four games last week, and they have looked like a team we simply haven’t seen this year. Can they keep it going? Or is this just a blip on the radar?
Is this the Olli Jokinen the Jets paid for? After a half season of abysmal play, Olli Jokinen has played pretty well for the most part this year. When Bryan Little eventually cools off a bit, I feel a little bit more comfort in the hopes of the Jets scoring knowing that Olli Jokinen is able to play at a somewhat decent level.
How long will this drought go? I get that the Jets power play is pretty stagnant, pretty slow, and well… pretty terrible. You would have to think that at some point something would just happen to go in. Right?

Final Thought

Consistency continues to be the key word hovering around the Winnipeg Jets. Sure these glimpses of solid hockey are great, but this team is still sitting in the basement of the Central Division, despite playing the most games. They need to start playing this way, if not better, on a regular basis if they want any hope of crawling out of a terrible situation.