Jets Nation Recap: Winnipeg Jets soar in Tampa Bay

The Winnipeg Jets win! The Winnipeg Jets win!

The Jets beat the Tampa Bay Lightning 2-1 in what was a more dominant performance than what the score makes it seem. Fans should not complain going on 2-2-0 on the road without arguably their best centre and best defender while playing against some formidable opponents.

In the first the Jets allowed a few more chances than what a team would normally like, but luckily Ondrej Pavelec shut things down.

After that it was almost all Jets, all the time. The Lightning struggled to handle the Jets fast and voracious forecheck. There was one slip up when Mark Stuart gave the formidable Nikita Kucherov too much room and the young forward capitalized with his 26th goal of the season.

The Jets made up for it though with a goal from Drew Stafford coming off the wall while on the power play. The goal was all new Jets, with both assists coming from Jiri Tlusty and Lee Stempniak. Blake Wheeler then took advantage of a defensive zone turnover, scoring the game winning goal for the Jets.

It’s getting tight whether or not the Jets make the playoffs, but better maybe than not at all.

Let’s break it down.

Shut it down – Anytime you hold a team to only sixteen shots, you should be expecting a win unless their is some very slanted goaltending performances. No other team today generated less than twenty.

Pavelectric – The Jets defense didn’t give Pavelec many opportunities to be challenged, but when he was Pavelec made the saves the Jets needed. A nice change for the Jets as of late.

The Unheralded – There were some players that played noticibly well. Mark Scheifele and Paul Postma were two examples. Still, I wanted to send a little love how well the Andrew Ladd, Adam Lowry, and Michael Frolik line did in playing against some tough match ups but dominating them.

Individual scoring chances (iSC), shot attempt differential (Corsi +/-), non-blocked shot attempt differential (Fen +/-), and offensive zone face off as percentage of all non-neutral zone face-offs:

Shot attempt chart for all minutes:

(Courtesy: hockeystats.ca)

Shot location chart:

(Courtesy: war-on-ice)

Check out all those blocks in the prime scoring areas!

(Courtesy: Fox Sports)

This gif isn’t a recap… However, it was an important and defining moment in the game.

I don’t know about you guys and girls, but I was nervous as hell after seeing that.