The Jets wrap up the home part of their 2017 schedule as they host the New York Islanders.

The Jets came back from the Christmas break and played in a wildly entertaining game against the Edmonton Oilers that they ended up winning 4-3, but in the process lost forward Mark Scheifele for the next two months after he fell awkwardly into the boards. The Jets now will bump Mathieu Perreault up to the top line (where he kind of belongs if we’re being honest) while Paul Maurice will insert Shawn Matthias into the fourth line. Don’t be surprised if the lines you see to start the game tonight don’t remain the same as Maurice will likely try out a few different line combos. The area where the Jets need the most help right now is the power play as they’ve gone 0 for 10 over the last three games. They still are top five in the league with a 23.4% power play success rate, but it needs to get firing again.

The Islanders came back from the Christmas break and squeaked out an overtime win against the Buffalo Sabres as they needed a last minute goal in the third with the goalie pulled to tie things up (a goal that needed video review well after it happened as it first appeared to be a big glove save before video evidence showing that the puck had crossed the goal line) before getting an OT winner from super rookie Mathew Barzal. Barzal continues to make his case as favorite for the Calder trophy as his OT winner against Buffalo followed up the previous game where he had a hat trick against the Jets.

The Jets have struggled for quite some time against the Islanders and the game before the Christmas break on the 23rd was a prime example of that as they got blitzed early and often and ended up losing 5-2 in Brooklyn. The Jets have lost five of their last six against the Islanders and are 3-4-3 in their last ten games played dating back to 2013.

Kyle Connor – Blake Wheeler – Patrik Laine

Mathieu Perreault – Bryan Little – Nikolaj Ehlers

Andrew Copp – Adam Lowry – Brandon Tanev

Shawn Matthias – Matt Hendricks – Joel Armia

Josh Morrissey – Jacob Trouba

Dmitry Kulikov – Tyler Myers

Ben Chiarot – Tucker Poolman

Connor Hellebuyck – Steve Mason

Anders Lee – John Tavares – Josh Bailey

Andrew Ladd – Mathew Barzal – Jordan Eberle

Shane Prince – Brock Nelson – Anthony Beauvillier

Jason Chimera – Casey Cizikas – Cal Clutterbuck

Nick Leddy – Ryan Pulock

Adam Pelech – Scott Mayfield

Thomas Hickey – Dennis Seidenberg

Jaroslav Halak – Thomas Greiss

Losing Scheifele hurts, but if this team has proven anything this season, it’s not to count them out or expect they to roll over into defeat. Expect the same type of resolve we’ve seen from this club the past few months and expect a 5-4 Jets win.