Tonight, as the four game road trip continues, the Jets look to stop the red hot Tampa Bay Lightning. The Jets won against the Devils in New Jersey 4-3 on Tuesday. It was a fairly even start to this game, before the Jets jumped ahead to a 4-1 lead in the 2nd, before eventually just holding on for the win. Tonight, the Jets play their second of four games on the road against a Tampa team that is now 8-1-1 in their last 10 games. The fairly recent back to back champions are leading a competitive Atlantic Division, but there are four teams within just 5 points of them.

The now 29th overall 21-24-7 Winnipeg Jets and 2nd overall 33-14-4 Lightning will clash at Benchmark International Arena, with these two teams looking for the two points in this rare matchup. We’re almost at the end of the month with the busiest part of the 2025-26 NHL season schedule. After tonight, the Jets still have 3 more games before the 3 week Olympic break which starts in early February.

The Jets and Lightning have not yet met this regular season. The season series continues (and concludes) in just over a month, March 5th, in Winnipeg. These two teams have had some high scoring matchups in the past few seasons, and the Jets are 7-3-0 in their last 10 games against the Lightning. With a win tonight the Jets would take a 1-0 season series “lead” against this elite Atlantic Division team who is trying to make their way back to being a serious Stanley Cup contender.

The injury report for the Winnipeg Jets still has three names: Haydn Fleury has an upper body injury and continues to be listed as “week-to-week”. Neal Pionk is also listed as “week-to-week” with a lower body injury, and that’s still the same status for Colin Miller, who recently had knee surgery. The Lightning have a not so grand total of five names on their injury report. Victor Hedman is recovering from an elbow injury which will keep him out of the lineup for possibly another week. Emile Lilleberg is out with an undisclosed injury for around another week. Brayden Point, Charle-Edouard D’Astour and Ryan McDonagh all have lower body injuries which will keep them out of the lineup either “day-to-day” or until the Olympic break.

Connor – Scheifele – Vilardi

Perfetti – Toews – Pearson

Niederreiter – Lowry – Namestnikov

Koepke – Barron – Iafallo

Morrissey – DeMelo

Samberg – Salomonsson

Stanley – Schenn

Hellebuyck

Comrie

The unconfirmed starting goalie is Connor Hellebuyck, as Eric Comrie will likely get one more start before the Olympic break. After Hellebuyck’s most recent start against the Devils, he now holds a 13-14-6 record with a 2.70 GAA and a .902 SV%. The Jets lineup is set to be mostly unchanged from their last game, as they once again shuffled the forward lines, including Gabriel Vilardi moving back up to the top line. As usual, there could be some announced lineup changes by the Jets prior to the game, so make sure to stay tuned to the Jets official X/Twitter account for any late lineup additions or changes prior to puck drop.

Hagel – Cirelli – Kucherov

Guentzel – James – Goncalves

Girgensons – Gourde – Holmberg

Bjorkstrand – Paul – Finley

Moser – Raddysh

McDonagh – Cernak

Carlile – Crozier

Vasilevskiy

Johansson

The Lightning lineup is without a couple key players, but still features several very talented players and some “lesser known” players who the Lightning have been utilizing correctly to achieve positive results. Looking at the Lightning’s player stats through 51 games, Nikita Kucherov leads the way with 80 points, good for 3rd in the league. Andrei Vasilevskiy is the unconfirmed starting goalie, who’s making a case to be the Vezina Trophy favourite. Vasilevskiy continues to be an elite goalie, and he’s been posting some fantastic numbers throughout this season. Vasilevskiy holds a 22-7-3 record with a 2.13 GAA, 1 shutout and a .916 SV%.

Tonight the player to watch from each team will be a forward who provides a certain important skillset to their team. Adam Lowry is one of the Jets forwards who has “underperformed” in terms of production this season, but he’s still providing some quality attributes to this team. Lowry plays like a Captain on a nightly basis, showcasing hard work on the defensive end and on the penalty kill. In 40 games, Lowry has 4 goals and 8 assists for 12 points. The Jets depth scoring continues to slowly improve, and Lowry’s overall play lately will hopefully lead to some goals for the Jets Captain.

On pace for his 4th straight 110+ point season, Nikita Kucherov is once again showing the league that he’s still a premier superstar. Kucherov will likely never surpass his 144 point season from 2023-24, but he’s still among the league’s top scorers at age 32. In 47 games this season, Kucherov has 26 goals and 54 assists for 80 points. With 11 points in his last 5 games (even without Brayden Point in the lineup), Kucherov is excelling with his offensive flair on the top line with Brandon Hagel and Anthony Cirelli.

Puck drop in Tampa Bay is set for just after 6:00 pm CST. Tonight’s game will be another chance for the Jets to get out of the bottom five in the league standings, as they’d like to pull off the upset against this talented Atlantic Division opponent. Stay tuned here at Jets Nation for a recap of the action, as the Jets look to defeat the 2020 and 2021 Stanley Cup Champions.