Nikolaj Ehlers made his series debut in an attempt to provide a boost for the Jets, who were already without Mark Scheifele (injured in Game 4) and Josh Morrissey (injured in Game 3).
He played 21:10, the most of any Jets forward, and had eight shot attempts, but none of them hit the net. He didn't want to get into what his injury was immediately after the game, he was just disappointed that the season that began with so much promise had come to an end.
"We wanted to come in here tonight and get a win and go back to Winnipeg and use our crowd and get another one at home and take it from there," said Ehlers. "Anytime you're out, it sucks. There's no other word for it."
Vegas used some quick offence to gain momentum, scoring in the opening minute of the first and second periods.
The game's opening goal came 50 seconds into the game. Chandler Stephenson's third of the series came on a backdoor pass from Mark Stone, as Stephenson found some space to Connor Hellebuyck's right.
"It lets their fans really get into it. You start from behind the eight-ball, you're already kind of behind the eight-ball missing two key players on our team," said Lowry. "I think after their start we started to play better, we started to get on the forecheck and for the rest of it I thought it was a fairly decent period."
The problem was the Jets couldn't get back on even footing, even after steadying things later on in the first.
"We have to push back. There has to be a pushback. There has to be pride," said head coach Rick Bowness. "You have to be able to push back when things aren't going your way. We had no push back."
Another early period goal helped Vegas build on the lead in the second, as Stone's wrister from the high slot beat Hellebuyck high on the glove side just 42 seconds into the middle frame. Then, less than four minutes later, William Karlsson - posted just outside the crease - tapped in his fourth of the series to make the lead 3-0.
Stephenson added his second of the game, a power play marker, 3:56 later to make it 4-0.
"After Game 1 you feel so excited, and even coming into tonight I was confident," said Brenden Dillon. "It seems like they capitalized on their chances, for sure. We just couldn't get one when we needed to. Timely goals, we just weren't able to get the job done."
The second period proved to be where Vegas did the majority of its damage in the series, outscoring Winnipeg 10-3.
"We just didn't really generate enough offensively," Dillon said. "They did a good job, defensively, taking that stuff away."
In a move to try and generate more offence, Bowness pulled Hellebuyck with just over eight minutes left in regulation and the Jets still trailing 4-0. Kyle Connor got the Jets on the board with 5:38 to go, scoring his third of the series.
It looked like Winnipeg got within two with just over two minutes left, but a Pierre-Luc Dubois tally was taken off the board by a Vegas challenge for a missed stoppage - the result of Blake Wheeler using his hand to win an offensive zone face-off.
All the Jets could do was watch the final seconds tick off the clock, as their season came to an end.
"There's going to be some time to reflect, take some positives from the season and use it going forward," said Lowry. "I think the series was a lot closer than a 4-1, five-game series. Like I said earlier, we're disappointed with the results. You battle so hard to get to the playoffs, you want to go on a run. You want to make a difference, you kind of want to make something magical happen. And we didn't."
