The Winnipeg Jets sure like playing extra hockey lately.
For the fourth game in a row the Jets couldn’t decide things in regulation, but this time they came out on the right side of 3-on-3 play, coming from behind late to take down the Chicago Blackhawks 3-2 in overtime on Tuesday at the Canada Life Centre.
After struggling to generate chances for much of the first two periods, Cole Perfetti tied the score with the goalie pulled with 39 seconds left, and Mark Scheifele won the game in the extra frame to give the Jets a much needed two points.
It was Scheifele’s third point of the night after recording the primary assist on both their first two goals.
Following back-to-back overtime losses, the Jets now have at least a point in all four games since the Olympic break.
“Every game we’re fighting for our lives at this point,” said Perfetti. “And no team is going to hand it over to us. So, there’s gonna be games where we’re up, where we’re down. Tie games going late in the game, we got to make sure there is no quit.
“That fight has to be there throughout the whole time.”
Dylan Samberg scored the only other goal for the Jets.
The Hawks took their first lead only 32 seconds into the final frame, but Winnipeg outshot the Blackhawks 15-1 over the final 14 minutes of the third.
“We didn’t do a very good job in the first two periods of getting through the neutral zone and if we did, we didn’t have numbers and we didn’t have speed to get in on the forecheck,” said Jets head coach Scott Arniel. “They got out of their zone real quick. And I just thought we did a way better job of it in the third. We got in, we got heavy, and we won some puck battles.
“I liked the way each line kept going out and rolling one right after the other and it kinda kept the wave after them and it looked like they tired them out a little bit.”
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The game marked the start of their longest homestand of the season with eight straight on home ice, including six of them against Western Conference opponents.
It was only the Jets third overtime win of the season as they’re now 4-10 in games that go beyond 60 minutes.
The win leaves the Jets nine points back of a playoff spot with 22 games remaining and while it’s only an outside chance, they still believe a playoff spot is attainable.
“We do have a veteran group,” Arniel said. “So there’s a lot of guys that have maybe been in that situation before or been around that. I think we’ve seen it throughout the league in other years. Like I said this morning, you have to take care of your own business, and you just try to let everything fall into place.
“I can’t believe here I am sitting with whatever twenty something games left and I’m watching every single score and see what’s going on.”
Chicago earned the game’s first power play just 2:57 into the game but it didn’t last long. The Jets won the ensuing faceoff and sprung Cole Koepke on a partial breakaway where he drew a holding penalty, setting up 1:47 of 4-on-4 hockey.
It was during this run of play that Winnipeg opened the scoring with an unlikely source getting the job done.
Kyle Connor carried the puck into the Chicago zone before getting double-teamed and dropping it off to Scheifele. He spotted Samberg getting free by the opposite faceoff dot and sent him a pass.
Samberg took a moment to collect it before whipping a shot that eluded Spencer Knight for his first of the season and first since Mar. 16 of last year.
Winnipeg held that lead for most of the period, but things changed when Gabriel Vilardi was handed a double-minor for high-sticking with 2:06 to go in the first.
The Blackhawks cycled the puck around the Jets zone before Frank Nazar got it in the corner. He skated towards the centre of the ice before noticing Teuvo Teravainen wide open in the slot. Nazar sent him the puck and Teravainen made no mistake, wiring a shot past Connor Hellebuyck to level the score with 1:12 to go in the first.
Winnipeg outshot Chicago 6-4 in the opening period and managed to kill the rest of the Vilardi penalty to start the second.
Chicago had a great opportunity to take the lead nine minutes into the second when Ilya Mikheyev got loose on a partial breakaway, but he was turned aside by Hellebuyck.
Other than that, there wasn’t much happening in the middle frame. Chicago outshot the Jets 10-7 but almost every shot was not of the dangerous variety, though Scheifele did hit a goal post.
It stayed 1-1 on the scoreboard going to the third but it only took 32 seconds for the Blackhawks to take the lead for the first time.
Sam Rinzel dumped the puck into the Jets zone from centre ice, sending it around the boards. Hellebuyck tried to cut it off behind the net but missed, allowing Connor Bedard to get to it in the corner. He dropped it to Ryan Greene at the faceoff dot, who wired it top-shelf past Hellebuyck to make it 2-1.
The Jets earned their first real power play chance of the game at the 3:07 mark of the third when Bedard was called for hooking, but Winnipeg couldn’t do much with it as Chicago got the kill.
After generating virtually no offence over the first 45 minutes of the game, the Jets started to ramp up the pressure in the final half of the third as they pushed for an equalizer, intensifying further when they pulled Hellebuyck for an extra attacker with 90 seconds to go.
Chicago survived a massive scramble in the crease in the final minute but, after the ensuing faceoff, Perfetti took a pass from Scheifele at the faceoff dot and beat Knight with a low wrister with 39.6 on the clock to tie the game and send it to overtime.
Teams traded chances in the first two minutes before the decisive moment happened.
Winnipeg had the puck in the attacking zone before a turnover nearly turned into disaster. But as Greene was about to send a stretch pass up the ice to Artyom Levshunov, Samberg knocked the puck away, retrieved it, and sent it across the ice where Scheifele had charged into the zone after coming off the bench.
He skated into the slot before burying a wrister past Knight to end the night with his 28th goal of the season and 18th career overtime winner.
Thanks to a dominant close to the game, the Jets wound up outshooting the Hawks 32-20.
Winnipeg will play its final game before the trade deadline Thursday against the Tampa Bay Lightning. The puck will drop just after 7 p.m. with pregame coverage on 680 CJOB starting just after 5 p.m.
