Jets road win streak snapped at five with loss to Kraken

SEATTLE - There were no excuses coming from the Winnipeg Jets dressing room, although after Sunday's 3-2 loss to the Seattle Kraken, they'd have every right to.
Playing their seventh game in 11 days, the second half of a back-to-back, with the second game of that back-to-back set coming earlier than the puck drop the previous night, the Jets had a number of - not excuses, but factors, perhaps - stacked against them.
Still, they had leads of 1-0 and 2-1 after the first and second periods, but two goals from the Kraken - a motivated squad who had lost five of six coming into the game - sealed Winnipeg's fate.
"We were half a step behind physically and then mentally, we complicated the game a little bit. When you do that, you're on your heels a little bit too much," said head coach Rick Bowness. "That goal early in the third kind of hurt us a little bit, clearly. But we just couldn't generate anything in the third period."

Mark Scheifele and Pierre-Luc Dubois scored for the Jets, with both goals coming on the power play. David Rittich stopped 31 of 34 in the loss, which dropped the Jets to 20-10-1.

Bowness shuffled some of his lines in the final period to try and get one final push, but unlike the trip in November when the Jets tied the game in the final seconds of regulation and won in overtime, the equalizer was nowhere to be found on Sunday.
"That's two times we had to play a late game on a Saturday night and come in here and play an early five o'clock game against Seattle," said Josh Morrissey. "We battled both games and found a way to get a point - got two points last time - we couldn't hang on tonight. But I liked the battle we had considering that's not an easy thing to do."
For the second night in a row, the power play got the Jets off to a good start 8:26 into the game. A 5-on-3 advantage (which was supposed to last for 1:14) needed only three seconds to convert, as Dubois won a face-off back to his left, and a brilliant slap pass by Morrissey found the stick of Scheifele - who made no mistake.
Scheifele's 19th of the season was also the 30th assist of the season for Morrissey, and set a franchise record for the longest point streak (nine games) by a defenceman in franchise history.
"It's definitely something that I don't take for granted," said Morrissey. "When you play with great players and give them the puck, assists, obviously you need to get them the puck and they need to score. It's easy with the guys that we have on our team."
In the second, Jordan Eberle's spinning backhand attempt went off the side of David Rittich's mask and in, tying the game at one with 11:17 remaining in the middle frame.

Winnipeg took advantage of their second power play to snag the lead back, though. This time it was Dubois who buried one, his 15th goal of the season, cleaning up the loose puck after Philipp Grubauer stopped a Kyle Connor one-timer. Morrissey picked up his second assist of the night on the goal, which made the score 2-1.
The team's power play was 2-for-3 on the night, and 3-for-5 on the two-game road trip.
"Power play looked great, some great plays," said Scheifele. "We executed, scored on the five-on-three early. We would have liked to have a little more five-on-five. That's something we've definitely got to look at. "
Seattle got back to even terms just 16 seconds into the third, as Ryan Donato deflected home his sixth of the season and extended his goal streak to three games. He was posted just outside of Rittich's crease, and got a stick on a Yanni Gourde shot from the right side, sending the puck into the top corner to level the contest at two.
Then Jared McCann put Seattle ahead for good with 4:32 remaining in the third, as his quick release beat Rittich short side, over the left shoulder, making it 3-2.

Winnipeg tried to push back, but weren't able to get back the all-important equalizer, with perhaps their best chances coming earlier in the contest as Morrissey hit a post and Kevin Stenlund was stopped on a partial break.
Even with an injury depleted roster running nearly on fumes, the Jets still felt they had a chance.
"We got it right down to the last five minutes," Bowness said. "You hope at that point you can find away to hang on and we didn't tonight."
Now the Jets head home for a brief two days. The first will be a day off before hosting the Ottawa Senators on Tuesday night, then, the Jets will fly east for back-to-back games before the holiday break.
With a schedule like that, they'll earn every bit of that break.
Until then, there is work to be done.
"They were flying, we weren't," said Scheifele. "That definitely wasn't our best game and there are things we would have done differently if we could do it over. But we've got to park that one and get some rest and get ready for Ottawa."