ST. LOUIS – After one game against the Eastern Conference, the Winnipeg Jets hop right back into the grind of divisional contests tonight when they take on the St. Louis Blues at Enterprise Center.
In fact, both stops on this two-game road trip involve facing off with a Central Division foe (the next stop is in Dallas on Thursday), with the Jets looking to improve their divisional record from its current 2-0-1 standing.
To do so, they’ll have to bounce back from Saturday’s 3-2 loss to the Carolina Hurricanes, a game that Winnipeg saw a lot of positives in – despite the final result.
“It was a good benchmark game for us,” said Cole Perfetti following Monday’s practice. “When we do play our style, we came out in the first period and took it to them. So, now it’s just keeping that going, shift after shift and game after game and not changing how we look or how we play.”
Perfetti , who played 16:34 in the game and tallied three shots - credited the Hurricanes for playing their style shift after shift for 60 minutes and feels it’s something the Jets will continue to work toward.
“That’s why they’re the Stanley Cup champions. It’s not an easy thing, but that’s our focus,” said Perfetti. “For me, that’s the takeaway and that’s what we have discussed in this room. Going out there every single shift, line after line and looking the same way.”
The Jets will hold a morning skate on Tuesday. That will be the best indication of whether head coach Scott Arniel plans to make any changes to the line-up for the first of four meetings with the Blues this season.
Winnipeg recalled forward Brayden Yager from their American Hockey League affiliate, the Manitoba Moose, on Monday (and put defenceman Josh Morrissey on injured reserve retroactive to October 7). The 21-year-old Yager scored the overtime winner for the Moose on Sunday afternoon, and at the time of his recall was ranked inside the AHL’s top 10 in points with nine (five goals, four assists).
“My conversations with (General Manager Kevin Cheveldayoff) and Arnie, kind of getting sent down, was to go drive offense and drive the play and try to be the best player,” said Yager. “I feel like you know Mark Morrison giving me lots of ice time and an opportunity to do that obviously helps, and playing with some pretty good players down there.”
Yager is a big part of Manitoba’s 5-1-0 start to the season, and Arniel said a number of players on the roster are off to strong starts. In fact, Arniel had a lengthy conversation with Moose head coach Mark Morrison and Moose General Manager Craig Heisinger about just which player to call up.
“They're having success down there scoring a lot of goals,” said Arniel. “Sometimes, you kind of look at it with the position, that might be whatever it is, but right now, like I said, Brayden had a really good training camp. We’ll start with him and we'll see how it moves forward.”
As for the Blues, tonight’s tilt with Winnipeg is the first game of a five-game home stand. St. Louis will be looking to get back in the win column as well, following a 5-2 loss at the hands of the Nashville Predators on Saturday.
Also similar to the Jets, the Blues are dealing with some injury issues of their own. Logan Mailloux, Tyler Tucker, Alexey Toropchenko, and Ross Johnston are just some of the players on the injured list for the Blues.
If last year’s season series proved anything, it’s that goals will be at a premium between these two squads, and any one of those could end up being the game-winner. The Blues won the opener of the season series 1-0, with the Jets winning the next three (and two of those were one-goal games as well).
Puck drop is set for 7 pm CT.
