Jets shut out Predators, take lead for 2nd wild card in West

WINNIPEG -- Connor Hellebuyck made 28 saves, and the Winnipeg Jets gained ground in the Western Conference wild card race with a 2-0 win against the Nashville Predators at Canada Life Centre on Saturday.

"Without [Hellebuyck], we probably would have lost some games down the stretch that we had," Jets forward Nikolaj Ehlers said. "He's kept us in this fight. We like him a lot. … The way that he's played for us all year and the last couple of years, but especially this year, is pretty impressive."
Mark Scheifele scored his 40th goal of the season for the Jets (44-32-3), who have won three of four. Hellebuyck got his fourth shutout of the season.
"When you're dominating the game like that you've just got to stick with it," Scheifele said. "You know, you start to worry when you're not getting the chances, and we had plenty of them tonight."

The Jets moved one point ahead of the Calgary Flames and three ahead of the Predators for the second wild card into the Stanley Cup Playoffs from the West. The Flames lost 3-2 in a shootout at the Vancouver Canucks on Saturday.
Winnipeg and Nashville each has a game in hand on Calgary.
Juuse Saros made 36 saves, including 19 in the second period, for the Predators (40-31-8).
"You don't really have much time to think when so many shots come against you," Saros said. "They spent quite a bit of time in our zone there, so you just try to see the puck as well as you can."
Scheifele said, "Saros played amazing. He's one of the best goalies in the world for a reason and he kept them in it. It was obviously good to get those two (goals) and it would've been nice to make it a little less close, but when you play against a good goalie it makes it tough."

Scheifele made it 1-0 at 15:06 of the second period, circling in from the left boards and scoring with a wrist shot from the top of the right face-off circle. He extended his NHL career high for goals.
"Forty goals, that's a [heck] of a season, and he's got three more games to add onto that," Winnipeg coach Rick Bowness said. "And he could have had the empty-netter. I think that's a good example of our perseverance tonight. We stayed with it. We were getting all of those chances. He hit the post a couple of times. He had some great looks. But we stayed in the fight, and Mark's goal was a perfect example of that."
Neal Pionk made it 2-0 at 1:36 of the third with a wrist shot after Ehlers found him trailing on the rush.
"They were on top of people and didn't give us a lot of time and space," Nashville coach John Hynes said. "But there were multiple opportunities where I thought we just threw pucks away and then we got half-iced in the game. So that was the biggest lesson coming out of this game, where we need to do a better job against Calgary on Monday."

Predators forward Cody Glass hit the crossbar from a sharp angle with 5:31 remaining.
"This group is resilient," Hynes said. "We always respond. It's taking the lessons out of this game. This didn't go the way we wanted it to go, but we're still hunting, we're still going to put pressure on this team."
NOTES: The Predators went 3-for-3 on the penalty kill. … Nashville defenseman Dante Fabbro had a game-high eight hits and four blocked shots in 23:56 of ice time. … Scheifele became the sixth player in Jets/Atlanta Thrashers history to score 40 goals in a season and the third since the franchise moved to Winnipeg for the 2011-12 season, joining Patrik Laine (44, 2017-18) and Kyle Connor (47, 2021-22). … It was Hellebuyck's 32nd NHL shutout and his third in 25 games against Nashville. He has made 11 straight starts and leads the NHL with 62.