Tonight at Canada Life Centre the Jets play their 71st regular season game of the 2025-26 NHL season. The Jets won in a shootout 3-2 on Sunday against the New York Rangers, and now the Jets are preparing to host the Vegas Golden Knights. The Golden Knights are fortunate to be in the struggling Pacific Division, as with overtime and shootout losses they’ve lost more games than won, but they’re still currently 2nd in that division.

The Jets will battle against a team that is 4-6-0 in their last 10 games and are sitting 18th overall in the league standings, but they’re still in a Western Conference playoff spot. The Jets are still five points behind the Nashville Predators for the second wildcard spot, but the Jets playoff odds remain pretty low with only 11 games remaining after tonight. The 27th overall 29-29-12 Winnipeg Jets will be looking for their 30th win of the season.

The Jets and Golden Knights met once earlier this regular season. The season series started back on January 6th in Winnipeg, where the Jets squeaked out a 4-3 overtime win. These two teams will meet one more time after tonight this season on April 13th in Vegas. The Jets will either win the season series tonight or the Golden Knights will tie it up at one win each with one more game to go.

The injury report for the Winnipeg Jets now has just three names: Colin Miller, Nino Niederreiter, and Vladislav Namestnikov. Miller has resumed skating on his own recently, but none of these three players are close to returning to the lineup. The Golden Knights have dealt with a handful of injuries throughout the season, including Alex Pietrangelo and William Karlsson who are out for the season (likely but not confirmed for Karlsson). Jonas Rondbjerg, Alexander Holtz and Carter Hart are the other Golden Knights out for the next part of the season.

Connor – Scheifele – Iafallo

Perfetti – Lowry – Vilardi

Koepke – Toews – Nyquist

Lambert – Barron – Rosen

Morrissey – Pionk

Samberg – Salomonsson

Fleury – DeMelo

Hellebuyck

Comrie

Injured: Nino Niederreiter, Vladislav Namestnikov and Colin Miller

The unconfirmed starting goalie is Connor Hellebuyck (17-19-11), who will likely start after Eric Comrie was in net against the Rangers. The Jets lineup appears to be without any changes (from last game), as the Jets seem to have their line combinations set for their last dozen games in the regular season. As always, there could be some late 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.

Barbashev – Eichel – Stone

R. Smith – Marner – Dorofeyev

Howden – Hertl – Kolesar

C. Smith – Dowd – Sissons

McNabb – Theodore

Hanifin – Korczak

Lauzon – Andersson

Hill

Schmid

Injured: Carter Hart, Wililam Karlsson and Alexander Holtz

The Golden Knights lineup features a mix of newly acquired players (from the past few seasons) and a few players who have been around since the beginning of the Vegas franchise. Looking at the Golden Knights’ player stats through 71 games, Jack Eichel leads the way in points (despite missing 8 games) with a very solid 74 points in 63 games. Adin Hill is the unconfirmed starting goalie. In his fourth season with the Golden Knights, Hill has struggled at times as the Golden Knights starting goalie. Hill has a 9-8-3 record with a 3.03 GAA and a .869 SV% and 1 shutout, and Hill will be using his upcoming starts to prove that he can be the Golden Knights starter when it’s playoff time.

Tonight the player to watch from each team will be their leading goal scorer. In the case of the Jets, Kyle Connor is tied with Mark Scheifele for the team lead with 31 goals. In 70 games, Connor has 79 points, which puts him 2nd on the Jets. The success of Scheifele and Connor this season is a big reason why the Jets aren’t lower in the standings than they already are, as they’ve shown they can maintain their consistency even when a season isn’t going well. Watch for Connor to try to end the season as close to 40 goals as possible.

Pavel Dorofeyev is a rare example of a Golden Knights draft pick which wasn’t traded and has been with the team since his draft year. Dorofeyev didn’t immediately make an impact in the NHL, spending some time in the AHL for parts of three seasons. After 47 games in the 2023-24 season, Dorofeyev had his breakout season in the 2024-25 season when he scored 35 goals. This season, in 71 games, Dorofeyev has 34 goals and 24 assists for a career high 58 points. Dorofeyev could tie his career high in goals tonight, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he reaches 40 goals this season as one the Golden Knights forwards in the top 6 who continues his success throughout the season.

Puck drop in Winnipeg, Manitoba is set for just after 7:00 pm CDT. Tonight’s game will be a pretty tough test for the Jets, who will be trying to stay in the hunt for a wildcard spot with every game remaining being important. Stay tuned here at Jets Nation for a recap of the action, as the Jets look to pick up a much needed win ahead of back to back games against the league leading Colorado Avalanche on Thursday and Saturday.

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