After a 4-2 win at Canada Life Centre on Saturday night, the Jets hit the road for their final two pre-season games. Tonight, the Jets are in Minnesota to take on the Wild at 7:00 pm CT.

Minnesota Wild fans rejoiced this morning at the news that they’ve resigned star forward Kirill Kaprizov. After months of waiting and uncertainty, the Wild signed Kaprizov to the richest contract in NHL history. Kaprizov agreed to an 8 year, $136 million deal, as the Wild have officially locked up one of the best scoring forwards in the league.

Yesterday was a day filled with not so positive news for Jets Fans. Dylan Samberg has been ruled out for 6-8 weeks with a broken wrist. With Samberg out, this makes the final two pre-season games extra intriguing for the defencemen battling to make the opening night roster.

At practice Monday morning, Connor Hellebuyck left after not “feeling right” in the words of Scott Arniel. There was no real clarity on what his status would be for tonight’s game, but earlier this morning Arniel confirmed that it was only precautionary and Hellebuyck will be ready to make his pre-season debut tonight.

The last piece of Jets news yesterday was their roster cuts, which included sending multiple players on waivers. This stage of the pre-season is the time where all 32 teams have to start making a significant amount of transactions as they get closer to announcing their opening night rosters. At practice this morning, the Jets line combinations (with a mostly fully veteran lineup) looked a little different than usual.

What looks like some “experimentation” with the lines at practice makes a lot more sense when you see tonight’s projected Jets lineup. Some of the veterans at practice aren’t in the lineup tonight as the Jets want to give some of their younger players one more look before additional roster cuts are made.

Jonathan Toews is centering the top line with Cole Perfetti and Nino Niederreiter, while Gabriel Vilardi is on the 2nd line wing with Alex Iafallo and Vladislav Namestnikov. The 3rd line features newly signed Cole Koepke and two of the Jets top prospects, Brad Lambert and Nikita Chibrikov. Rounding out the forwards is the 4th line of David Gustafasson, Jaret Anderson-Dolan and Parker Ford.

On defence the Jets are going with a top pairing of Logan Stanley and Neal Pionk. Haydn Fleury pairs up with Dylan DeMelo, and Ville Heinola finds himself on the 3rd pairing beside Colin Miller. With Samberg ruled out for 6-8 weeks, a competition for his spot in the lineup will begin tonight, which includes players such as Logan Stanley, Ville Heinola, Colin Miller and out of the lineup Elias Salomonsson.

Connor Hellebuyck, the reigning NHL MVP, makes his NHL pre-season debut tonight. Scott Arniel confirmed a few days ago that Hellebuyck will also be the starting goalie for the Jets pre-season finale on Friday night against the Flames. Eric Comrie will be tonight’s backup, and although it’s likely that Hellebuyck will play the full 60 minutes, Comrie could still see a period or two in net before the season begins.

Tonight should be an exciting matchup in Minnesota as the intensity builds up prior to the regular season opening night. Stay tuned here at Jets Nation for full game coverage (on social media) and a recap of tonight’s game!