Race to postseason kicks into gear for Blue Jackets

If Monday was the day Blue Jackets fans could dream of the potential of what this year's team could be after
four separate trade-deadline moves
, Tuesday was a reminder of just how difficult the journey will be.
With three of its new acquisitions in the lineup, Columbus lost a 5-2 decision at home to Pittsburgh, and in doing so fell out of the eight-team playoff field in the Eastern Conference.
Wins by the Penguins, Montreal and Carolina pushed Columbus (73 points) to the No. 9 spot, two points behind the Habs and one each behind division rivals Pittsburgh and the Hurricanes.

"It seems like because we made a few deals and we get a couple of good players -- and they are good players -- it should never change who we are," head coach John Tortorella said. "It's not like we're going to skill our way into the playoffs. We need to make sure we understand -- everybody is talking about playoff rounds and this and that about the Columbus Blue Jackets, and we're out tonight, I believe, in the standings.
"We better understand we need to get in. We're not going to skill our way in, no matter what the transactions were. We need to stay true to our identity or we won't have a chance."
Columbus is now in the final quarter of its schedule, with exactly 20 games to go until the season ends April 6 at Ottawa. The Jackets do have one game in hand on Pittsburgh and Carolina and two in hand on Washington and Montreal.
So what will the road to the playoffs look like? Here's a primer.
Playoff percentages
First of all, the numbers indicate the Jackets have a strong chance to make the playoffs, but it's not going be easy.
According to
Hockey-Reference.com's projections
, the Jackets have a 74.5 percent chance to qualify for the postseason. Five teams -- Tampa Bay (100 percent), Boston (99.6 percent) and Tortonto (99.6 percent) out of the Atlantic Division and Metro foes the Islanders (98.7 percent) and Washington (91.5 percent) -- are likely in, leaving one final Metro spot and two wild card spots for four teams.
Of the teams battling for those positions, Pittsburgh (79.1 percent) is next followed by the Jackets, Carolina (72.2 percent) and Montreal (69.7 percent).
MoneyPuck.com
is a little more bullish on the Jackets, with the team at 77.91 percent to get in, while
Dom Luszczyszyn over at The Athletic
has the Jackets at 76 percent. Generally, no matter where you look, it's a 3 in 4 shot according to projections, which makes sense with essentially four teams battling for three spots and all in a similar boat, points-wise.
The schedule
Columbus' 20 games will feature just three games against teams that are essentially playing out the string -- one each against New Jersey (March 5), the Rangers (April 5) and Ottawa (April 6). That means a lot will be on the line down the stretch.
Perhaps the most competitive games will be the four Metro showdowns against the Islanders (March 11, March 26) and the Penguins (March 7, March 9), which will be four-point games against the teams the Jackets are battling for position. The same could be said of a March 15 home game vs. Carolina and a March 28 home game vs. Montreal. Those are six critical games, four-pointers as people like to call them.
The Jackets also have five games on the fringes of the playoff race but likely not to qualify at the moment -- two vs. Edmonton as well as games vs. Philadelphia, Vancouver and Buffalo.
There's also three games vs. Boston as well as contests against Winnipeg, Calgary, Nashville -- playoff teams all of them.
In short, there's six games against the teams the Jackets are directly competing against, six vs. other playoff teams, five against teams battling to get back in the race, and three against teams that are out of it.
The travel
Looking at the schedules of the teams the Jackets will be battling down the stretch, the Islanders have what appears to be the easiest travel-wise. Eleven of New York's last 20 games are at home, the team has just three back-to-backs, and the furthest west it has to go is Winnipeg.
Columbus has some of the toughest travel, with nine home games remaining and 11 road contests, including a Western Canada swing to Edmonton, Calgary and Vancouver in mid-March. The Jackets also have five back-to-backs, tied with Carolina for the most among Eastern contenders.
Pittsburgh and Carolina each have 10 home game and nine road contests to go, while both Washington and Montreal have eight home games in the last 18.
Pittsburgh and Montreal also each have three back-to-backs to go, while Washington has just one. Montreal is the only team with a true Western trip left, as the Habs must visit California, while Carolina must play at Colorado.
Circle the dates
If you're a Jackets fan, a nine-day, five-game stretch starting next week might be one of the most fun and exciting stretches of the season.
Four of the games in that span will come against the teams the Blue Jackets are competing against for playoff positioning in the Metropolitan Division.
The Blue Jackets play at Pittsburgh on March 7, host the Pens two days later, then go to Long Island to take on New York on March 11. Then, after a home game March 12 vs. Boston, Columbus welcomes Carolina to Nationwide on March 15. That's a big string of four-point games in a row.
After that, Columbus plays just two games against a team vs. which it is directly competing for a playoff spot -- a two-game homestand March 26 and 28 vs. the Islanders and Montreal, respectively.