GAMEDAY: Jets at Red Wings

DETROIT – Winnipeg Jets head coach Scott Arniel has seen his group play six quality periods in the last two games, and knows they’ll need to add another three to that pile tonight against the Detroit Red Wings.

However, he and the players are hoping to finally get the reward they desperately want.

After all, their reward for those six great periods has been an overtime loss to Minnesota and a hard-fought 3-1 loss to Edmonton that saw the Jets outshoot the Oilers 42-21.

“We just played a team that went to the Stanley Cup finals two years in a row and we spent an awful lot of time in their end of the rink,” Arniel said after the loss to the Oilers. “Our process, in our end of the rink, we're keeping these top teams under 10 scoring chances, five-on-five. For me, the process, I can keep saying that, but at the end of the day, just keep doing what we're doing. Hopefully we can score some goals and we can get some points."

The Jets (15-18-4) are trying to snap a six-game skid tonight at Little Caesars Arena, where they earned a 6-2 victory last October when Kyle Connor registered his 500^th career point. Since that memorable night in front of numerous friends and family, the Shelby Township, Michigan product has reached 600 career points and 300 goals.

Connor saw some friends and family shortly after the Jets arrived in Detroit, and will see more immediately after the game. He’s hoping to be doing that visit after putting two points in the standings.

“Any win right now we’re hoping is the one that gets us started. No better place than right now, right here, tonight,” said Connor. “It’s a short road trip, but you also have a back-to-back and can kind of stack those points up if you win those. We’re excited and we thought we’re trending in the right direction the last couple games.”

Speaking of milestones, another member of the Jets will hit a milestone in Detroit, with Josh Morrissey playing in his 700^th career game. This comes one night after Adam Lowry scored in his 800^th contest at the National Hockey League level.

“It's no secret secondary scoring has really been an issue for us. So I felt like it helped bring the building to life,” said Lowry. “But I would trade that for a win.”

That’s been the sentiment for many of the Jets that have hit personal milestones in their career. So the focus tonight is solely on getting the road trip off to a good start.

Looking back at Winnipeg’s last three road trips (dating back to the start of November), they’ve dropped the first game of the trip in Los Angeles, Washington, and St. Louis. All of those came after the Jets posted a perfect 4-0-0 record on the road in October.

“They’re a fast team, transition team, a lot of skilled guys that can make you pay,” said Gustav Nyquist of Detroit. “We have to be ready for that. It’s kind of similar to the Edmonton guys with the speed they try to play with. Again, just worry about our own game, keep building, and get the result tonight.”

Nyquist, who was drafted by the Red Wings in the fourth round of the 2008 NHL Draft, will once again be on a line with Nino Niederreiter and Vladislav Namestnikov (another former Red Wing), with the team’s full projected line-up looking like this:

This current three-game trip will see Winnipeg play three times in four nights, with a set of back-to-backs in Detroit and Toronto to close out 2025 and open 2026.

As for the Red Wings, they’re coming off a 3-2 overtime win over Toronto on Sunday. Detroit is 7-3-0 in their last 10 games and have a trio of former Jets on their roster: Ben Chiarot, Andrew Copp, and Mason Appleton.

The 29-year-old Appleton was part of Winnipeg’s Presidents’ Trophy winning group in 2024-25 and had seven assists in 13 playoff games. So far with Detroit, who he signed a two-year deal with in July, Appleton has four goals and 10 points in 30 games.

Detroit holds top spot in the Atlantic Division and is in pursuit of their first postseason birth since 2016. Part of the reason they find themselves in that spot is the 11 comeback wins they’ve amassed this season.

“They’re a real good transition team and they have some speed in their line-up,” said Arniel. “A little bit like what we saw with Edmonton and Minnesota, you have be leery and careful about making sure numbers don’t get above you. We’ve done a better job of that, so that’s going to be a key tonight against this group.”

The 22 goals Detroit has scored in the first period is the second fewest in the NHL, while the 54 they’ve racked up in the second period are the most in the league.

So if Winnipeg finds itself in another close, one-goal style of game, they’ll need to stick to the structure they’ve shown over the last six periods and trust that, when the final buzzer sounds, they’ll get the reward.

“We look at the contributions of certain guys in this room and what they've done in the past, they have long track records of producing offensively, good secondary rates,” said Lowry. “We know the predicament we're in. So we have to start making up ground. But I think we have the confidence, like I said, we go out there, we put together a body of work like we did (Monday), we'll get better results than we did.”

Puck drop is set for 5:30 pm CT.