Jets grab top spot in Central with win over Arizona

WINNIPEG - Sunday has all the makings of a trap game.
The Winnipeg Jets, winners of two in a row and seven of their last eight, coming home after a three-game road trip to face off with the Arizona Coyotes, who had lost eight in a row.
But instead of falling into the trap, the Jets (29-14-1) earned a 2-1 win and now sit atop both the Central Division and the Western Conference.
"I think anytime that you get this far into the season and you can be at the top of the division or the conference, yeah, it's meaningful," said Jets head coach Rick Bowness. "It's a credit to their resilience that we're sitting here where we are today. So give the players a lot of credit."

Avoiding the trap was simple in the mind of Blake Wheeler, whose 11th of the season held up as the eventual game-winner.

"These guys have given us a tough time in this building. And that goaltender has given us a tough time," Wheeler said of Karel Vejmelka, who had a 1.37 goals-against average and a 0.959 save percentage in four career games against the Jets coming into Sunday.
"I don't think we came here expecting to blow them out. We kind of knew the style of game it was going to be. We just stuck with it and got the two points, that's really all that matters."
Along with Wheeler's goal, Pierre-Luc Dubois notched the other tally to give him five goals and 12 points in the last 10 games.
"That was big for us tonight," said Dubois. "The better you can set yourself up for that point of the season, the bigger it is for the end of the year. You want to finish strong at the end of the year."
The game's opening goal didn't come until the second, despite the Jets outshooting the Coyotes 12-4 in the opening period. A tripping call to Lawson Crouse at the end of the opening period gave the Jets a power play that extended into the second, and that's when the home side lit the lamp.
A Josh Morrissey one-timer, teed up by Nikolaj Ehlers, was deflected by Dubois in front of the Arizona net 37 seconds into the middle frame. The goal was Dubois' 20th of the season, the fourth time in his career that he's hit that mark. Morrissey's assist also gave him 40 helpers on the year, making him the third fastest in franchise history to hit that mark in one season (44 games).
The goal is also the type of offence Dubois believes can win games late in the season.
"There's going to be games towards the end of the season and in the playoffs that's going to be one-goal games, 1-0, 2-1, and not much given in the middle and a lot of low-to-high shots and tips," he said. "Those are really hard to stop, because the defensive team always has to be awake, you always have to grab sticks. You forget for one second and it's in the back of your net."

Arizona countered by scoring on their first shot of the period, which came with 8:58 left in the second. Clayton Keller got the puck with speed in the high slot, and when Connor Hellebuyck came out to cut down the angle, the Coyotes forward delayed his shot. He kept moving to the left, and sent a shot into the top corner past a sprawling Adam Lowry to tie things up.
That was the only puck to get past Hellebuyck, who made 20 saves and spent long stretches of time without facing a shot. Still, he earned his 22nd win of the season - putting him second in the NHL in that category - and came up with a couple big stops in the final minutes to preserve Winnipeg's one-goal lead.
Natural Stat Trick credited the Coyotes with eight high-danger chances at five-on-five, and Bowness found that the visitors played a similar style against the Jets as they did the night before in Minnesota - which also resulted in a 2-1 Coyotes loss.
"They frustrated Minnesota," said Bowness. "Their gaps are really good so they don't give you a lot of room and the only way to open that up is to get a two goal lead."
While the Jets could never get that two-goal lead, they were able to get in front for good with 3:15 to go in regulation thanks to a three-way passing play from Wheeler, Mark Scheifele, and Cole Perfetti.
Perfetti drove toward the right post and left a drop pass for Scheifele in the right circle. Quickly, Scheifele went cross-ice to Wheeler, who had a wide open net.

Wheeler flashed a big smile as he was joined by his teammates for the celebration.
"I was just tired and wanted to get off the ice. I was hoping one of them would score," laughed Wheeler, who now has 897 career points. "Scheif had a bit of a break and it was kind of tough to get it to him. And then was just trying to create some space there for Cole. Those guys made a couple great plays and it was up to me to shovel it in."
The assist moved Scheifele into second on the franchise scoring list with 616 points, passing Ilya Kovalchuk's 615.
The Jets held the lead the rest of the way, setting themselves up for a five-game road trip on a winning note.
"I think to set ourselves up with 25 or 30 games left after the break, and the playoff race, really, that's when it's going to start," said Dubois. "If we can set ourselves up really well here, with this last road trip and then a couple games at home, we can put ourselves in a really good position and not trying to claw ourselves back up to the top.
"So it's an important road trip. It starts Tuesday in Montreal and then we keep going from there."