Game Notes: November 29 vs. Chicago Blackhawks

The Winnipeg Jets host the Chicago Blackhawks tonight in the second game of a two-game homestand…The Jets started the homestand with a 4-3 loss to the Pittsburgh Penguins on Tuesday night…After tonight’s game, the Jets begin a three-game road trip on Saturday against the New Jersey Devils.

Game Notes PDF

Rarity
The Jets enter tonight’s game having lost three of their last four games in regulation…The last time the Jets lost three of four games in regulation was a three-game losing streak from Mar. 6-11/17…Since that losing streak, the Jets are 75-30-13, which is the third-best record in the NHL.

Against the Central
The Jets are 4-3-0 against Central Division teams this season…The Jets wrap up playing three of their last four games in November against Central Division teams after playing just one Central Division team in their previous 11 games…Since the start of the 2016-17 season, the Jets are 38-20-4 against teams within their own division, which is second behind the Nashville Predators (39-19-4)…In that same time frame, Blake Wheeler leads all NHLers in scoring against the Central Division with 78 points (26G, 52A) in 62 games, while Mark Scheifele is second with 71 points (29G, 42A) in 54 games.

Feeling the Power
Despite not scoring a power play goal in back-to-back games (0-for-3), Winnipeg still leads the NHL in power play scoring percentage at home this season at 36.4% (12-for-33)…This is the first time this season the Jets have gone consecutive home games without a power play goal…Patrik Laine and Mark Scheifele lead the Jets in power play goals at home this season with four goals each.

Top Line
The Jets top line of Mark Scheifele (2G), Blake Wheeler (2A) and Nikolaj Ehlers (2A) each had a pair of points on Wednesday…It was Scheifele’s third multi-goal game of the season, which is second on the Jets to Patrik Laine’s four multi-goal games…It was Blake Wheeler’s team-leading eighth multi-point game of the season.

November Reign
Jets captain Blake Wheeler is tied for sixth in NHL scoring in November with 18 points (2G, 16A) in 11 games…However, he’s second in assists with 16 and points per game with 1.64…Patrik Laine has racked up 16 goals in November, which leads the NHL and has established a franchise record for most goals in a calendar month…Since the 1987-88 season, the most goals scored in a calendar month by an NHL player in happened in March of 1993 when Teemu Selanne scored 20 goals in 14 games playing for Jets 1.0 en route to setting the NHL rookie goal scoring record with 76 goals.

First Star
After racking up 11 goals in four games last week, Patrik Laine is the NHL’s First Star of the Week…He opened the week with a hat trick in a 6-3 victory over the Vancouver Canucks on Monday before scoring twice in a 6-3 loss to the Calgary Flames on Monday and scoring in a 4-2 loss to the Minnesota Wild on Friday…Laine capped the week by setting a franchise record with five goals in a 8-4 victory over the St. Louis Blues on Saturday…This is the fourth time in his career that Laine has been selected as one of the NHL’s Three Stars of the Week and is the third Jets player to be selected in 2018-19 after Winnipeg had eight appearances in the Three Stars of the Week last season…Laine joins Blake Wheeler (Nov. 12 – Second Star) and Mark Scheifele (Oct. 29 – Second Star) as members of the Jets that have earned NHL Three Stars of the Week honours this season.

Closing in on 100
Laine enters tonight’s game with 99 career goals in 178 games…Laine is poised to become the 10^th player to score 100 goals with the Jets franchise…Currently, the fastest player in franchise history to score 100 games is Ilya Kovalchuk, who did so in 209 games…Only six players in NHL history have scored 100 goals before reaching the age of 21.