WINNIPEG – The Winnipeg Jets were looking forward to facing their former teammate Connor Hellebuyck and then putting him in the rearview mirror.
Now, that will all have to wait.
When the Jets host Hellebuyck and the New Jersey Devils at Canada Life Centre on Tuesday, Jake Allen will be in the visitor’s net with Hellebuyck as the backup.
That news, announced Sunday night by Devils general manager Sunny Mehta, did not sit well with Jets coach Scott Arniel.
“To me, it goes back to the ownership, it goes back to the fans, it goes back to the core guys that have been with ‘Helly’ from the very beginning, that he kind of left on,” Arniel said Monday. “That’s the part for me that is hard. He just gave up on us, and it would be nice to be finally done with this and all it does is drags it out, and nine more game from now, we’re going start into it and talk about it again here. That’s the biggest disappointment for me.”
The nine-game comment is a reference to the Jets playing in New Jersey on Nov. 28 at Prudential Center.
But the game Tuesday was the one almost everyone in Winnipeg had circled on their calendar since Hellebuyck was traded to New Jersey on Oct. 23 following his offseason trade request and his suspension from the team after he failed to report for training camp.
“This has been an organizational decision for us that we debated at length,” Mehta said in a statement. “Connor Hellebuyck was adamant that he felt a duty to play on Tuesday in Winnipeg. However, in our estimation, playing in this game would potentially give us a reduction in our expected win probability.”
Speaking after a 4-0 win at the Toronto Maple Leafs on Sunday -- the Devils’ (13-5-0) fifth straight win -- Hellebuyck insisted he wanted to play in his former home, but the decision was out of his hands.
“We definitely had a conversation and I told them my thoughts on it and they told me theirs, and at the end of the day, I have to listen to them and I can only push so hard,” Hellebuyck said. “I was adamant that I want to play, but it is what it is.”
Jets captain Adam Lowry, who was Hellebuyck’s teammate from 2015-16 until he was traded, said he was ‘surprised’ at the decision.
“But they probably had a lot of discussions, a lot of things that went into it that I’m not privy to,” Lowry said. “So, it’s hard to pass judgment on what went on. He’s not playing, we would have been excited to face him and I’m sure he would have been excited to face us and there would have been a lot of buildup around the game, but we’re focused on continuing to play well and looking to get another two points.”
Arniel now expects things to drag out and questions about facing Hellebuyck to spring up again when the Jets play at the Devils on Nov. 28. Tuesday is the only time New Jersey plays at Winnipeg this season.
“I just wanted this to kind of end,” Arniel said. “This has been throughout the summer, it’s been through our training camp, it’s been all the way through the trade and now it’s continued on. I was just kind of hoping it would be done after tomorrow night.”
Hellebuyck had a stellar career in Winnipeg. Selected by the Jets in the fifth round (No. 130) of the 2012 NHL Draft, he made his NHL debut in the 2015-16 and over the next 11 seasons would go 345-208-55 for the Jets, winning the Vezina Trophy as the best goalie in the NHL three times (2019-20, 2023-24, 2024-25) and the Hart Trophy as the NHL most valuable player in 2024-25. The Jets made the postseason seven times in his tenure, reaching the Western Conference Final in 2017-18.
Last season, he helped lead Team USA to the gold medal in the 2026 Winter Olympics, beating Canada in overtime in the gold-medal game.
He signed a seven-year, $59.1 million contract Oct. 9, 2023, which has an $8.5 million average annual value, but after the Jets missed the playoffs last season, he told Winnipeg management he wanted to be traded.
On Aug. 27 he released a statement saying he had requested a trade from the Jets. He failed to report to training camp on Sept. 16 and was suspended by the Jets. He was traded the day the suspension was to end.
Since arriving in New Jersey, he’s 5-0-0 in with a 1.96 goals-against average and .913 save percentage. He made 23 saves in the win against the Maple Leafs on Sunday.
After playing in Winnipeg, the Devils have a home-and-home with the Washinton Capitals on Thursday and Saturday; it’s believed Hellebuyck will play both games against a Metropolitan Division opponent.
Jake Allen will get the start for New Jersey. The 36-year-old is 9-11-3 with a 3.18 goals-against average and .884 save percentage in 24 games against Winnipeg. The 11 regulation losses are the most he’s had against any team in the NHL.
As the visiting team backup goalie, Hellebuyck will likely not be visible to fans during the game. He is expected to either sit in the tunnel behind the visitor bench out of view or in the New Jersey video room.
When he was the backup with Winnipeg, Hellebuyck would watch the game in the Jets video room.
The only opportunity Jets fans may get to see him is during the warmup. And if Winnipeg had planned to run a tribute video for his return, those have likely been shelved.
The game comes with the Jets (7-8-3) on a three-game win streak, which was extended when they pulled out a 4-3 win against the Tampa Bay Lightning on Sunday with forward Mark Scheifele scoring the winning goal on the power play with 1.6 seconds left in the third period. The Jets were up 3-0 going into the period and gave up three goals in a span of 4:05 in the last half of the period.
The streak started at the Montreal Canadiens a week ago, when Winnipeg battled back from a 4-0 deficit late in the third period with four goals in 2:06, and then won the game in overtime.
“I would have loved to play against him, we’d all be lying if we said we weren’t looking forward to the opportunity,” Lowry said. “Like I said countless times, he’s a good friend of ours and it’s always fun going up against buddies or ex-teammates, you just want to best them. I think the atmosphere would have been great whether fans were upset, or they wanted to thank him, whatever. It would have been an emotional night, and it would have been a lot of fun.”
