Today’s match features the two goalies in the Jets 2.0 era who have been considered the club’s “number one” guys.

When Ondrej Pavelec came up north with the rest of the Atlanta thrashers, there was a hope that the newly christened Winnipeg Jets already had their franchise number one goalie. The 24 year old Pavelec had shown promise in his time with Atlanta along with flashes of athleticism that made him an intriguing goalie to watch in the future. All he needed to work on was his mechanics and positioning – things he at times showed he could grasp – and there seemed to be little doubt the Jets would be fine in goal for years to come as everyone expected when the club announced a 5 year, 19.5 million dollar deal back in 2012.

Only it didn’t work out quite that way. Pavelec just turned out to be average.. A serviceable NHL starter most nights, but he still relied on overly athletic saves instead of sound, fundamental positioning. This often led to almost nightly highlight reel saves that thrilled media and fans a like and would get him featured on weekly play of the week segments, but little else.

There was his play in the 2014-15 season however that does standout, including a run of three straight shutouts to help propel the Jets into their first ever playoff series since the NHL’s return to Winnipeg. That season he finished with a .920 save percentage going 22-16-8.

The same year that the Jets committed five seasons to Pavelec, they drafted Connor Hellebuyck in the fifth round, 130th overall in the 2012 draft. Hellebuyck signed with the club two years later and joined their AHL club in St. John’s where he started putting up impressive numbers and earned a spot in the 2015 AHL All-Star game . His NHL debut came that fall with the Jets as he split time between the Moose and the Jets filling in for an injured Pavelec. Fans – many of whom realized Pavelec wasn’t going to turn out to be the franchise goalie they hoped for – started to look to Hellebuyck as a potential savior in net.

In the 2016-17 season, he beat out Pavelec for the starters job as the Jets decided to go with Michael Hutchinson while Pavelec was sent to the AHL. The Jets were hoping the young tandem could play a 1A-1B system as they were ready to move on from Ondrej, but the experiment didn’t go as well as hoped and both Hutchinson and Hellebuck struggled, leaving the same fans who a year earlier were thinking Hellebuyck’s time was coming soon to wonder if he ever would have a time as a true number one guy at all.

Hellebuyck re-dedicated himself to his craft with a new off-season training program and this past season the results were phenomenal. A save percentage of .924, 44 wins which marked a record for American born goalies and a trip to the playoffs where he helped the Jets make it to the Western Conference Final.

 

This one might not be close at all both due to recency bias as well as overall results, but Pavelec did have his supporters back in the day, let’s see if they can come through for him.