Ehlers a full participant on Monday, officially remains day-to-day

After all the video work Rick Bowness and his staff have done on the Vegas Golden Knights, two things became evident to the Winnipeg Jets head coach.
First, he gave full marks to Bruce Cassidy and the Golden Knights for the work they put in to reach top spot in the Western Conference.
Second, he doesn't think Vegas has seen the best of the Jets.
"That's what we really want to do from the get go tomorrow night," said Bowness. "We want to come out of the gates playing, and playing aggressively. We don't want to sit back and let them dictate the play and see what's going to happen. That's not our team, we're at our best when we're the aggressors and pressuring them all over the ice."
He acknowledges that's always easier said than done, but Bowness is confident in his team even if this series on paper is a top seed going against a wildcard.

After all, last spring with Dallas, Bowness and the Stars took the Flames all the way until overtime in Game Seven. In fact, there might be a similarity between this year's Jets and last year's Stars.
"When we got in trouble against Calgary last year, we were giving them too much respect and sitting back too much," Bowness said. "Especially with our team, we're a better team when we're aggressive and playing on our toes."
Monday was the final full day of preparation for the Jets ahead of Tuesday's first game against the Golden Knights. For a regular season road game, the team normally travels the day before the game, but they changed that routine this week.
Instead, the Jets travelled after practice on Sunday so they could practice at T-Mobile Arena and get acclimated routine-wise to the Pacific Time zone.
That allowed for a full 50-minute skate on Monday, a skate that saw Nikolaj Ehlers as a full participant.
Bowness still says the winger is day-to-day, but if Ehlers has his way, he'll be in the line-up Tuesday night. After all, the loss in 2018 is still in his mind, and he'd like to have a chance at changing the ending in the rematch.
"Obviously it's, what, four or five years ago, but there are still a couple guys in here that remember that series," Ehlers said. "We want to give them some payback. It's going to be a super fun series. The fans here, the fans we have back in Winnipeg, it'll be unreal."
The full Jets line rushes looked like this:
Connor-Dubois-Scheifele
Ehlers-Namestnikov-Wheeler
Niederreiter-Lowry-Appleton
Barron-Gustafsson-Maenalanen
Morrissey-DeMelo
Dillon-Pionk
Samberg-Schmidt
Kevin Stenlund hasn't skated since sustaining a lower-body injury on Thursday, shortly after scoring a shorthanded goal against the Colorado Avalanche. However, Bowness isn't ruling him out for Tuesday.
"Kevin is going to skate tomorrow morning," Bowness said. "I'd say we're counting on him playing, but he'll probably be a game-time decision. Just talking to him now, he's feeling better. If he's feeling strong enough tomorrow, he'll play."
Stenlund, who had three goals and nine points in 54 games this season for the Jets, has two games of playoff experience on his resume. While playing for Columbus in 2019-20, he scored once against Tampa Bay during the summer version of the Stanley Cup Playoffs in the Toronto bubble.
So while Stenlund knows a bit of what to expect when the puck drops in the playoffs, Dylan Samberg will be experiencing the NHL's postseason for the first time.
The 24-year-old defenceman won back-to-back NCAA national championships with Minnesota-Duluth in 2018 and 2019, and couldn't be more excited to help the Jets try to make some noise this spring.
"It's a once in a lifetime experience kind of thing. You never know when you're going to make it," said Samberg. "You have to make the most of it. There is obviously going to be some nervousness, but in a good way.
"Talking to a lot of the guys, they say it's a good experience and it's good to get the experience under your belt."
As has been said over the course of the last few days, the playoffs are all about playing the game at the highest level, riding the emotions, and staying even keel.
On any given night, any player can be the hero. It often comes down to just one play, one bounce, or one decision.
While Samberg and Stenlund want to add more experience to their playoff resume, Ehlers and a number of Jets have a few years' worth of games to look back on.
But no matter how much experience one has, Ehlers believes every game comes down to a mindset.
"In the playoffs, that's when you want to play your best. If it's not points, it's something else," he said. "You try and win games for this team and you'd do anything for it. We're excited for it, I'm excited, and I'll obviously give my all for this team."
ICE CHIPS
Cole Perfetti skated with the team in a non-contact jersey on Monday. Everything was going well until the forward was accidentally bumped by one of his teammates.
"He turned and bumped into one of our guys. That's when I sent him off the ice," said Bowness. "Listen, he's 10 days or two weeks away."