The Winnipeg Jets squandered leads twice in a 3-2 pre-season loss in Minnesota Tuesday night, but the main concern is the status of Jonathan Toews.
Winnipeg’s top off-season pickup played his last shift of the game just shy of the midway point of the second period.
“He just tweaked something,” head coach Scott Arniel told 680 CJOB after the game. “We’ll just wait and see, we’ll wait until we get home, get it looked at and go from there.”
Vladislav Namestnikov also had to exit the game after taking a hit from behind in the third period, but he didn’t leave the game on his own volition.
“That was the (concussion) spotter,” said Arniel. “Spotter took him out. He’s fine. He said he’s fine. Nothing you can do about that. He actually was more of, I’m gonna say upper-body, not his head though. But he was fine. He was fine. The spotter said he had to come out.”
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Namestnikov and Cole Koepke scored the goals for the Jets in the loss, while Connor Hellebuyck only made 16 saves in his pre-season debut.
The Jets had two different one-goal leads, but the Wild scored twice in the second period to take the lead, and there was no scoring in the final frame.
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“I thought it was a real good effort,” Arniel said. “We got to their goalie early, twice we got up with the lead, but a couple mistakes on our specialty teams. A little bit of the difference there in the second, but you know what, there was no quit. We had some great looks at the end, obviously their goaltender made some key stops.
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“Guys are battling for jobs. Some guys really stepped up and did a good job of taking advantage of maybe the opportunities that were thrown at them.”
Logan Stanley, Ville Heinola and Haydn Fleury were all in the Jets lineup as they battle for the extra job on the blueline after the injury to Dylan Samberg.
“There was some times where we maybe didn’t move quick enough,” said Arniel. “Or we weren’t quite sharp enough, but I did like a lot of what each and every one of those guys brought, whether we had to use Ville on the power play, Stan was doing a good job with his size, and I thought that Flur skated well. Those are the things they have to continue to do and with Sammy being out, those guys have to continue to play at a high level.”
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Winnipeg opened the scoring at the 5:24 mark of the first when Koepke was in the right place at the right time in the Wild end. He intercepted a pass in the Minnesota end and deposited it past Jesper Wallstedt to make it 1-0.
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Just shy of 12 minutes into the period, the Wild drew level when Matt Boldy got free behind the Jets defence and walked in alone on, beating Hellebuyck high in the Hart Trophy winner’s first game of the pre-season.
The game remained tied until the opening minute of the second period. Alex Iafallo won a puck battle behind the Minnesota net and fed Namestnikov in front for a tap-in to make it 2-1 for Winnipeg.
Minnesota got things level again on the power play just shy of seven minutes into the second. With Dylan DeMelo in the box, Kirill Kaprizov, fresh off signing the biggest contract in NHL history, deflected a point shot past Hellebuyck to tie the game.
The Jets failed on their first power play look of the night and during their second PP chance, the Wild took the lead. Neal Pionk attempted an ill-fated D-to-D pass on the backhand and it was intercepted by Marcus Foligno. He blazed up the ice with the puck and beat Hellebuyck to give the Wild their first lead of the night.
Winnipeg outshot Minnesota 12-7 in the second and 13-7 in the third but 3-2 would be the final score.
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The third period was marked by a couple of questionable hits by the Wild. Namestnikov was crumpled into the boards by Yakov Trenin and just a few minutes later, Parker Ford was hit from behind.
Winnipeg is expected to ice a lineup that either closely or completely resembles its opening night roster when they conclude their preseason schedule Friday night in Calgary.
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