Scheifele's two goals help Jets to victory in road trip finale

The Winnipeg Jets saved the best for last on their three-game road trip.
They opened the trip with a loss in Detroit, then earned a win in Buffalo they weren't happy with, then put in one of their best performances of the season in a 4-1 win over the Pittsburgh Penguins on the back half of a back-to-back to close out the trip.
"Give the players full marks for playing the way we did," said head coach Rick Bowness. "There were no passengers tonight. Everyone contributed. Everyone did the job they were asked to do."
Mark Scheifele scored twice for his seventh multi-goal game of the season, with Blake Wheeler and Nikolaj Ehlers adding singles in the victory, which moves the Jets to 28-14-1, and into a tie for top spot in the Central Division.

"It was a total buy-in from everybody tonight," said Dylan DeMelo, who had two assists to give him 14 points on the season, one more than all of last season, and 100 total points for his career. "When we're willing to buy in and play that way, we're a tough team to beat. It's quite evident. We looked like a different team tonight than we did against Buffalo."

The Jets capitalized on their first power play opportunity, as a Neal Pionk point shot caused all kinds of chaos in front of Dustin Tokarski. Adam Lowry kept the puck alive after a Cole Perfetti rebound attempt, and Blake Wheeler, with one knee on the ice, swatted the loose puck home at the 11:19 mark o the opening period.
Wheeler's 10th of the season was assisted by Perfetti, who was a gametime decision due to illness, but his 17th of the season moved him into third in NHL rookie scoring. He'd add two more assists on the night for his second three-point performance this season.
Not bad for someone that could barely play due to a stomach illness the night before.
"Kind of just woke up and felt pretty good, felt decent. Stomach was feeling a lot better, but I didn't have much energy," Perfetti said. "Started to get some energy, and then around 3:30, 4 - right around the 24-hour mark - is when I started to feel like a human again."
A coach's challenge for offside took away a goal from Scheifele, and exactly 60 seconds later, Pittsburgh tied the game. Drew O'Connor potted a Kasperi Kapanen pass off the rush, with the puck banking off Rittich and in.

Once again, the Jets scored, only this time it was waved off immediately. Pionk's slapshot from the point was deflected by Pierre-Luc Dubois, but the centre's presence in the crease impeded Tokarski's ability to make the save. The Jets tried a coach's challenge to reverse that decision, but it was upheld, and the game remained tied.
"That's the toughest one. Offside is pretty black and white. Goaltender interference isn't," said Bowness. "You have to stick up for your players too. If they're doing everything you ask them to do, and you think they're in the right, you have to challenge it. If it doesn't work, it doesn't work."
The Jets remained persistent, and it paid off late in the second with two goals in 22 seconds.

The first came off the stick of Scheifele with 2:02 left in the period, and it finished off a three-way passing play with his linemates. Perfetti sent a cross ice pass to Wheeler in space, and the big forward drove to the front of the net before dishing a perfect feed to Scheifele in front. Scheifele neatly tucked it home for his 25th of the season.
Just over 20 seconds later, Ehlers took a pass from Kyle Connor on the left wing and beat Tokarski on the glove side for his third of the season. The assist extended Connor's point streak to nine games, while Ehlers has a four-game point streak and has racked up eight points in that span.
Those two goals gave the Jets a 3-1 cushion going into the final period.
"Those (goals) were obviously big," said Scheifele. "I think we had all lines looking the same. Every line was getting the puck deep when they needed to, shutting it down when they needed to. When you have all the players doing the same thing, it makes it tough for a team to gain any momentum or get any sustained pressure."

Scheifele's second of the game made it 4-1 in the third. DeMelo jumped in from the blue line to assist Perfetti in a puck battle and sent a perfect pass cross-ice to Scheifele in the left circle. Scheifele had a wide open net to look at, and he made no mistake, pounding home his 26th of the season with 13:21 remaining in regulation.
"What he's doing this year and being able to play with and seeing first-hand from him the goal-scoring ability that he has, it's eye-opening," Perfetti said of Scheifele. "It all comes down to how smart he is, getting to the open ice, finding where to go. It's pretty special playing with a guy like that."
The Jets took four of a possible six points on the road trip, and will now play their lone home game - in a stretch that sees them play eight of nine on the road - against Arizona on Sunday.
They'd love to take a carbon copy of the win over Pittsburgh and apply it that night.
"When we all buy in and play that type of style, a style we think is going to win later on in this season and hopefully in the playoffs, that's a tough style to go up against," said DeMelo. "We know what it's like going up against teams like that. If we can continue to do that day in and day out, we're going to do a real good job here."