It’s now exactly 1 month (30 days) until Winnipeg Jets regular season hockey is back. It’s also likely the last week of the off-season without some sort of new Jets news, as the Young Stars Classic begins in Penticton, BC on Friday. We’re all still waiting on the last Jets RFA (Cole Perfetti) to sign his contract extension, but I’m at the point now where I’ve accepted that it’ll happen when it’s ready to happen.

Since there was a great number of responses across our social media about bold predictions for the Jets 2024-25 season, we’re back with a part 2. My strategy for picking my chosen 3 predictions was making sure they were bold, but of course only bold to a point where they can be somewhat realistic. Without wasting anymore time, let’s get right into part 2 of 2 of your bold predictions.

Bold Prediction 1: @of_brandon on Twitter / X: Heinola plays and is teamed with DeMelo after trading Pionk + Lowry gets 55 pts this year.

Connor: I’ve spoken before about being a fan of Ville Heinola, and how I think it’s finally time that he gets a full season in the NHL. A lot of mock lineups for the Jets projected defence still don’t seem to include Heinola, which is fair, but at the same time they fail to recognize his potential. If and when Heinola does enter the Jets lineup, (even if it’s not at the start of the season) I believe Heinola will show enough to make him a regular in the lineup.

Neal Pionk’s name has been brought up in trade discussions for this upcoming season due to his expiring expensive contract and sometimes inconsistent play. I don’t think you can split up the top pairing of Morrissey and DeMelo, but if Pionk is traded it would make sense for Heinola to play on the 2nd pairing with someone like Dylan Samberg or Colin Miller who can shelter Heinola’s more attacking style.

As for Lowry, 55 points is a bit of a reach, but it’s certainly possible! 36 points is his career high, but if his linemates (likely Nino Niederreiter and Mason Appleton) have great seasons, that could easily translate to Lowry setting a new career high in points in the 2024-25 season.

Angus: Neal Pionk will probably play a lot with Josh Morrissey this season to minimize the damage from Pionk chaos. I would be shocked to see Pionk traded this season. If he was going to get moved it would have happened this offseason. Who in the NHL is going to eat that contract and give up an asset in his final year of his contact? He is also in the final year of his contract.  He could become the defender we all knew he could be with that fire set under him.

Heinola with DeMelo makes sense. The veteran defender can mentor and be a leader for the back end. Which leads us to seeing Colin Miller with Dylan Samberg could be a solid shutdown pairing with a big shot the Jets need.

Lowry scoring 55 points is a long shot unless an injury happens to Mark Scheifele and Lowry steps up to the top line and is working with Vilardi and Ehlers/ Connor. But if Lowry is on the third line all season where he should be he might hit 40 points as a realistic number.

Bold Prediction 2: @VioletDante on Twitter / X: Gabe (Vilardi) is going to net 30+ goals and get 65 points.

Connor: A healthy Gabe Vilardi could be due for a breakout season in his 2nd full season as a Jet. The top line of Kyle Connor, Mark Scheifele and Vilardi could be very dynamic when they’re all playing at their best, and that includes Vilardi. In 2023-24, Vilardi scored 22 goals in just 47 games, so he was well on pace for 30+ goals. The tougher part of this prediction is the 65 points, but I think that if Vilardi plays close to full 82 game season, he could definitely finish with around 35 goals and 30 assists to reach that total of 65 points.

Angus:  Yeah if Vilardi plays a full season he’s probably going to be the first 2.0 Jet to score 50 goals. If he scores 50 goals 65 points will come easy.

Bold Prediction 3: @scottygram1081 on Instagram: They (the Jets) will be fighting for the number 1 pick this year.

Connor: I hate to end these bold predictions on a sour note, but I saw a few too many comments saying the Jets would be bad and miss the playoffs this upcoming season. This prediction was the boldest of them all, and I just have to say that it would take a LOT of things going wrong for this to even have a chance of being possible.

It’s less about what the Jets are lacking, but more about what the Jets already have. Players like Mark Scheifele, Kyle Connor, and Connor Hellebuyck (just to name a few) are enough to keep any team in the league competitive to a certain extent. All you really have to do is take a look at the rosters of some of the “worse” teams in the league, and then you’ll realize how nice it is for the Jets to have the team they currently have now, and that they won’t be in the draft lottery discussion at the end of the 2024-25 season.

Angus: I saw bold this and I booo’d it. Last place would only happen for the Jets if Scheifele, Kyle Connor, Josh Morrisey and Connor Hellebuyck all got hurt in early November and were hurt for the whole season. Could the Jets miss the playoffs this season? Yes, it is a real possibility, but the Jets picking in the top ten with Connor Hellebuyck as the starter probably just won’t happen.

There is just no way the Jets are worse than the Calgary Flames, the Chicago Blackhawks, the Ottawa Senators and the Minnesota Wild.

We hope you enjoyed this interactive mini series on your bold predictions for the Jets 2024-25 season. As mentioned at the beginning of the article, stay tuned later this week for the latest news on how the Jets prospects are doing at the upcoming Young Stars Classic, taking place between September 13th and 16th.