WINNIPEG — Not only did Mark Scheifele win the game for the Winnipeg Jets, he recorded a significant milestone in doing so.
The Winnipeg Jets assistant captain scored his 299th career NHL goal with 1:04 left in regulation to tie the game 1-1. Scheifele added his 300th goal just 38 seconds into overtime to give the Jets a hard-fought 2-1 victory over the Chicago Blackhawks in their home-opener on Friday night.
Scheifele’s face lit up after scoring No. 300, admitting it was pretty satisfying.
“It’s pretty wild," he said. "I’m just very thankful for the guys I’ve played with. I’ve been lucky enough to play with some really good players. It’s all thanks to them.”
Kyle Connor set up the game-winner by passing to Scheifele in front of the net. Scheifele knocked in a Nikolaj Ehlers rebound to tie the game.
"Those are big milestones,” said Jets coach Scott Arniel. “300 goals is a lot of goals in this league. To see that enthusiasm, he'd probably forgotten about it. He probably knew he was close.
"But at the end of the day, any time those guys can do that and do that in that fashion, when it's a tie game late and then winning it in overtime, he'll remember those goals, 299 and 300, for sure.”
Scheifele scored the tying goal on a backhand from his knees, finally beating Chicago netminder Arvid Soderblom.
“Obviously, getting that puck while he's falling down and getting a good whack, that's pretty good,” Ehlers said. "He scored two goals, two pretty important goals. So he had a good last two, three shifts. But he's a pretty good player and has shown that over the last many years.
"So I don't think it surprises any of us in this room. We've got a lot of guys that can chip in and did tonight. But obviously, it was huge for Scheif to get in where he needed to be to bury those two.”
Defenceman Neal Pionk made a big play on the tying goal as he checked a Chicago forward carrying the puck into the Jets' end with the net empty, not allowing him to get a shot off.
"The biggest thing is, he attacked the puck,” Arniel said. “He didn't back up. Because their guy had to get to the red line. If he waits and backs up, they might make another play, or the guy takes a shot at the net. The kid didn't want to ice the puck and (Pionk) did a great job of attacking him.
"He stopped that there and gave us a chance to get it back and get in and get the faceoff."
The Blackhawks had held the Jets scoreless for almost 59 minutes.
“We are a resilient group,” Scheifele said. “There were times in the second (period) where we got away from it a little bit. But we buckled down.”
Scheifele also credited goalie Connor Hellebuyck for stopping 25 of 26 shots to keep Winnipeg in the game.
“They (Blackhawks) played solid,” he said. “They made some good plays. They played with speed and tried to get us in a little bit of a track meet. Bucky (Hellebuyck), we needed him to make some saves, and he made them.
"From there we just needed to get back to our game and we did.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 11, 2024.
Jim Bender, The Canadian Press
