Hockey is a game of inches and the Winnipeg Jets lost by an inch tonight. One poor clearing attempt by normally reliable Olli Jokinen and the game is won. The play resulted in the San Jose Sharks only goal. With the puck on his stick Jokinen tried to clear theup the middle but the weak pass was intercepted by Sharks defender Justin Braun. Braun shot the puck on net the Sharks leading scorer Joe Pavelski batted the puck out of the air on the rebound for his 28th of the season.
The game was San Jose backup netminder Alex Stalock’s 2nd shutout of the season.
The Sharks outshot the Jets 32-20 on the night. On the California trip the Jets were outshot 73-41 showing just how far they still need to come to play with the big boys, despite the 1-1 record.
Olli Jokinen lead the Jets with 5 shots on goal, while Trouba lead the way on the back end with 4 blocked shots. The 19 year old rookie defenseman also lead all players on both teams with 24:32.
10 Thoughts
1) Jacob Trouba was the Jets best player tonight. Made plenty of great reads, throwing the big hits, solid positionally, jumping up at the right times. This despite being weighed down by a 2 ton anchor on the other side of him.
2) Meanwhile Devin Setoguchi was worse than invisible he seemed to be actively hurting the Jets. Bad turnovers, no creativity, bad positioning. Everything about his game in his former city was awful.
3) Enstrom-Bogosian continues to look the part of a top pairing. All the little things are working well. Enstrom even threw a big hit.
4) The offense was not great obviously since they were shutout. Many players appeared to be gripping their sticks way too tight, including Kane and Wheeler. Both guys were trying to do everything themselves out there. Both players looked like guys trying to break out of slumps, not players playing on hot streaks. An oddity.
5) The goons on the 4th were really useful eh? Maybe Tangradi – O'Dell – who cares might have really helped on the 4th line no?
6) Ellerby – Pardy were decent in limited minutes. Both look like they can hold their own as 3rd pairing guys. Exposed several times though.
7) Mark Stuart needs to be introduced to the press box. Really hurting the team out there with missed hits, bad passes, poor positioning.
8) Pavelec is creeping his save percentage back up towards his career average. Season now sits at .903. Looking confident, needs to keep that going.
9) Andrew Ladd had a solid game tonight. Controlling the puck well, made some nice plays. Jets need him to round into form if they want to make a run.
10) Glad to be out of California! That is one hard place to play.
Roll Call!
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<th width=20>#</th><th>Commenter</th><th># Comments</th>
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<td>1</td><td><a href="http://www.sbnation.com/users/HappyCaraT">HappyCaraT</a></td><td>41</td>
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<td>2</td><td><a href="http://www.sbnation.com/users/Sasukespecialman">Sasukespecialman</a></td><td>35</td>
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<td>3</td><td><a href="http://www.sbnation.com/users/Forget%20Teemu">Forget Teemu</a></td><td>31</td>
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<td>4</td><td><a href="http://www.sbnation.com/users/Daniel%20Lipson">Daniel Lipson</a></td><td>29</td>
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<td>5</td><td><a href="http://www.sbnation.com/users/Padre">Padre</a></td><td>25</td>
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<td>6</td><td><a href="http://www.sbnation.com/users/J-CA">J-CA</a></td><td>22</td>
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<td>7</td><td><a href="http://www.sbnation.com/users/jetsfanmike">jetsfanmike</a></td><td>15</td>
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<td>8</td><td><a href="http://www.sbnation.com/users/garret9">garret9</a></td><td>3</td>
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<td>9</td><td><a href="http://www.sbnation.com/users/RyderN17">RyderN17</a></td><td>3</td>
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<td>10</td><td><a href="http://www.sbnation.com/users/bcjet">bcjet</a></td><td>1</td>
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<td>11</td><td><a href="http://www.sbnation.com/users/maxthesilent">maxthesilent</a></td><td>1</td>
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<td>12</td><td><a href="http://www.sbnation.com/users/alexmac77">alexmac77</a></td><td>1</td>
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