DETROIT – Following a fast-paced season opener on Friday night, the Winnipeg Jets will have to start their pre-game routines much earlier on Sunday as the prepare to take on the Detroit Red Wings.
The Jets (0-0-1) will play their first of two match-ups with the Red Wings today at noon Central time. The goal, naturally, is to start the two-game road trip on a winning note, but it’s also to build on the positives from the 4-3 overtime loss to the Boston Bruins on Friday.
“I thought it was a solid game, but at the same time, we’ve still got a lot of stuff that we have to clean up. We know we’ve got to be better and that’s what we’re here for,” said Nino Niederreiter. “We’ve got 83 more to go. It’s a long season. You can’t make anything (definitive) out of the first game.”
Most of the discussion around the Jets dressing room Friday night and into Saturday’s practice at hockey for all centre revolved around the pace the team played at. Winnipeg’s forecheck turned over pucks in the Boston end and helped them defend well for the most part.
However, the focus is on playing at that pace consistently for 60 minutes.
“There was a lot of that sort of scrambly kind of part of hockey, and I just thought we did a really good job staying away from it,” said head coach Scott Arniel. “There are some areas for me that you know technically we'll go and look at that. Well we did look at that. We'll kind of show them tomorrow in the morning there before our next game. “
Kyle Connor comes into Little Caesers Arena with some momentum. He scored in his National Hockey League record ninth consecutive season opener on Friday, had nine shots on goal, and 14 shot attempts against the Bruins. He’s had success against the Red Wings in his career (in fact, he’s a point-per-game player against Detroit with 16 in 16 games) and the product of Shelby Township, Michigan also registered his 500th career point in the very building he’ll skate in today.
The 29-year-old’s biggest takeaway from the first game of the season was the speed that Winnipeg played with throughout the line-up.
“So much of the game is played without the puck, making reads, and using your feet to close. And obviously when you do have the puck, using your skill set,” said Connor. “If we're able to check with a ton of speed, move the puck forward, put it behind the D and play more straight-line speed, it's way tougher to defend. And it results in a lot more zone time.”
With the early puck drop, the Jets won’t hold a morning skate. Saturday’s short, but efficient, practice is the best indication of what the lines could look like – pending any changes head coach Scott Arniel and the coaching staff want to make.
While Gabriel Vilardi didn’t skate on Saturday, Arniel said it was for maintenance reasons and that the forward – who posted 30 goals for the first time in his career in 2025-26 – should be good to go in Detroit.
With Vilardi in the line-up, the Jets lines are expected to look like this:
Connor-Scheifele-Perfetti
Rosen-Bjorck-Vilardi
Barron-Lowry-Lambert
Niederreiter-Namestnikov-Iafallo
Morrissey-DeMelo
Samberg-Pionk
Fleury-Bauer
As far as the goaltender goes, Arniel didn’t reveal whether it would be Stuart Skinner (who stopped 26 of 30 on Friday) or Clay Stevenson between the pipes. Though with the next two games coming on back-to-back days, Arniel did say both goaltenders would be used.
“It's a busy schedule to start the year, so both guys will be going,” said Arniel. “All these games, about five in eight days, so you may be seeing (Stevenson) than once.”
As for the Red Wings (0-1-0), they dropped their season opener on Friday night to the New York Rangers by a score of 2-0. Detroit fell behind 5:12 into the contest on a power play marker from Rangers’ defenceman Sean Durzi, and the score stayed that way until Eeli Tolvanen’s empty-netter with 1:16 remaining in regulation.
The Red Wings won both games in the season series with the Jets last season, a 2-1 final on New Years Eve and a 5-1 decision a few weeks later on January 26.
Snatching a victory to start the road trip would not only snap that mini-skid against Detroit, it would also continue building momentum in the early part of the season.
“I watched a little bit of last night's game (against the Rangers),” Arniel said of the Red Wings. “They're quick. They'll transition fast and (they’re) maybe not as big and heavy as we kind of saw last night (from the Bruins), but still a foe that, they have a power play that's usually pretty good and just a team that has lots of offence.”
