GAMEDAY: Jets at Devils

A tough stretch of three games in four nights begins tonight for the Winnipeg Jets (34-20-1) against the New Jersey Devils, and defenceman Nate Schmidt sees tonight's game - and the two that follow it against the New York Rangers and New York Islanders - as a key test for the club.
Especially after the setback in Columbus to open the trip on Thursday.
"This kind of decides where you are as a team," said Schmidt. "This is really one last little audition before the deadline to say 'hey, this is what we are.' Against really good teams."
Schmidt's assessment of the Devils, Rangers, and Islanders as 'really good teams' is accurate. New Jersey is second in the tightly contested Metropolitan Division, with the Rangers just three points back of them, and the Islanders are in a battle for the final wildcard spot.
"We've got to play three good teams that are always typically hard to play against, when you have to come in here and play them all in a couple of days," said Schmidt. "It's a fun challenge."

To prepare for the first challenge in the Devils - who beat Pittsburgh 5-2 at PPG Paints Arena on Saturday - the Jets made some adjustments to their forward lines in a 75-minute practice session yesterday.
Head coach Rick Bowness used a similar concept to one utilized just prior to the All-Star break, putting a checker with offensively gifted duos.
"We've got a checker on each line, but we want that checker to get to the net," Bowness said. "We're not getting enough net presence. Yes it's for defensive purposes, but just as importantly for offensive purposes. We want the checkers on the lines to get to the net."
So, what does that configuration look like? Well, on Saturday, the Jets line rushes looked like this:
Connor-Dubois-Maenalanen
Perfetti-Scheifele-Appleton
Ehlers-Lowry-Wheeler
Barron-Stenlund-Kuhlman
Morrissey-DeMelo
Dillon-Pionk
Schmidt-Samberg
The other goal, Bowness said, is to try and get offensive contributions throughout the line-up.
"We have to start scoring some greasy goals. That's why we ended up putting Nik and Wheels with Lows," said Bowness. "We need more goals from that third line, it's as simple as that. It can't always be the top two lines - Scheif's line and Dubie's line - scoring goals. We need goals from that third and fourth line."

They also want to get more from the power play. Winnipeg got to as high as 10th in the NHL on the man advantage, but a 3-for-33 run since January 22 (including a 1-for-7 result in Columbus on Thursday) has slid the Jets down to 16th.
Bowness switched up both units on Saturday, putting Schmidt and Josh Morrissey with forwards Mark Scheifele, Blake Wheeler, and Cole Perfetti.
Schmidt is looking forward to running that unit from the top of the zone.
"You see so much more of the ice. You can tell where the plays are," said Schmidt, adding he needs to be a shooting threat just as much as a distributor. "It's my job to freeze the defenders, my job to shoot when I have to, to make sure I hold that defenceman tight to the net. And it's my job to know when it's time to give it to him."
The other unit the Jets will deploy includes Kyle Connor, Pierre-Luc Dubois, Nikolaj Ehlers, Kevin Stenlund, and Neal Pionk.
The reason for splitting them this way is because of a trend that Bowness and the coaching staff picked up on.
"We're getting (power plays) and what we're finding is the guys we want on the power play are on the ice," he said. "So we wanted to have the option that if Dubie's line is out there and they draw the penalty, then you go with Mark's unit. If Mark's line is out there and they draw the penalty, then you go with Dubie's unit. Then it's going to be up to them who is going back out."
That also creates the healthy, internal competition between the units to be as good as they can be.
"Our special teams have been in the top 10 for parts of the year. We need to get back to that to be considered the team we want to be, to be seen as the team we want to be seen as," said Schmidt. "You have to how other teams… they always have top power play, penalty kill units. It pretty much goes hand-in-hand with success in this league."
And that's exactly what the Jets are striving for - success.
The path to it isn't always linear, and multiple obstacles stand in the way.
The Devils present that next obstacle.
"They're dangerous on the rush," said Bowness. "It's going to be up to us to spend as much time in their zone as we can and make sure when they get it, we're above and we're not giving them the odd-man rushes they like to get."
Puck drop from Prudential Center is set for 6 pm CT.
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