Analyzing Jets trends: The up-and-down PK, Perfetti's step forward, Arniel for Jack Adams?

Connor Hellebuyck made a month’s worth of mistakes in a single night and Winnipeg’s special teams failed in their attempt to bail the Jets out. Now the Jets share their No. 1 spot in the NHL standings with Washington and head to Edmonton to face a reignited Oilers offence.

Nothing about Tuesday’s 6-2 loss to Vancouver — a potential first-round opponent — changes Winnipeg’s status as an elite, Stanley Cup-contending team. Despite Tuesday’s loss, the Jets are still barrelling their way toward a playoff spot and home-ice advantage. This is a story about the trends that could influence their fate.

Today we look at the Jets’ penalty kill; dig into Dylan Samberg and Josh Morrissey’s performance; evaluate Cole Perfetti, Nikolaj Ehlers and Vladislav Namestnikov’s playoff readiness; and discuss a much-needed breather for Adam Lowry’s shutdown line.

Is it time to give Lowry’s line a break?

In the 10 games before Tuesday night against Vancouver, the Jets’ typically dominant third line of Lowry, Mason Appleton and Nino Niederreiter had been outshot 55-38 and tied 3-3 in goals scored at five-on-five. That’s fine in a small sample but Lowry’s line has been the class of the NHL shutdown lines, outscoring teams 20-10 before last night’s game.

Lowry’s line got torched for rush goals by Logan O’Connor and Nils Höglander in the first period of Tuesday’s game, looking a step behind on each play. On the first, Niederreiter had nearly scored on a net drive, but Vancouver turned the puck up ice so quickly that it moved the puck around Lowry and Appleton’s hit attempts (coach Scott Arniel said the Jets were “overaggressive” on the play). The Canucks then backed Haydn Fleury and Colin Miller off in the zone to set O’Connor up for a one-timer with Hellebuyck on the move. On the second rush goal, Vancouver picked up a puck outside the Jets’ blue line, reloaded and beat the Jets’ third line with a stretch pass that broke its shape in the neutral zone. Lowry, Appleton and Niederreiter looked slow, not befitting their season-long excellence.

Sometimes I wonder if they need to be split up — even for a week or two — to give them a break from the heavy lifting they do night in and night out. Niederreiter has one assist in 13 games since the 4 Nations Face-Off break; Appleton has one goal and one assist in the same timeframe. Arniel ran Lowry between Brandon Tanev and Alex Iafallo to start the second period against Vancouver and got a goal from Iafallo for his troubles. It would make sense if we see that look again soon; Tanev and Iafallo have more going on for them over the last several games than Appleton and Niederreiter do.

Morrissey joins the PK and shows promise; Samberg is the goods

Samberg’s goals against Dallas and Seattle have given his importance a national spotlight this week. Hit the scoresheet, it seems, and suddenly everyone recognizes all the other ways you’ve helped all season long. When you take a deeper look at the changing nature of Winnipeg’s penalty kill, Samberg’s importance is made clearer.

This is a 10-game rolling average of the Jets’ PK success rate.

The overall trend for the season is slight improvement, with the team’s best work beginning at the top of 2025. But consider these events:

• Samberg breaks his foot against Nashville in Game 21
• Samberg returned from that injury against Los Angeles in Game 43

Remember that we’re looking at a 10-game rolling average. The data point for Game 43 — Samberg’s first game back — also includes Winnipeg’s performance in the nine games before his return. By Game 52, all 10 games in the data point include Samberg in the lineup — and, as it turns out, this corresponds with the Jets’ peak PK performance all season long. More Samberg, more success.

It’s also true that goals are a volatile measure of performance. A team can give up a ton of quality scoring chances for a while and get away with it with the right combination of big saves, good bounces and misfired shot attempts. The opposite is also true: Sometimes a PK does everything in its power on a given shift but the power play makes a perfect shot or gets just the right combination of bounces to get a goal.

This seems like a good time to mention a new data point: Josh Morrissey is averaging 45 seconds per game on the penalty kill this season after just six seconds per game last season and 20 seconds the season before that. Part of the magic behind Morrissey’s offensive explosion in the Rick Bowness and Scott Arniel era has been the result of careful management of his minutes. With Samberg and Brenden Dillon available, the Jets were able to spare Morrissey the heavy lift of the team’s short-handed work.

The combination of Dillon’s New Jersey Devils departure and Samberg’s broken foot changed Winnipeg’s plans. Logan Stanley’s PK workload went up when he was in the lineup and Fleury has played a big role, too. Morrissey is also too good at hockey to leave aside in this context. His minutes have had two spikes: first, when Samberg was injured, and second,  a seven- or eight-game stretch following 4 Nations wherein Morrissey took Stanley’s minutes as the Jets sought a different look.

Here are Winnipeg’s defencemen, sorted by average four-on-five PK time per game. What jumps out to you?

The first thing to note is that only Samberg, Dylan DeMelo and Neal Pionk have played over 100 minutes in this situation. When small sample sizes are involved, you get oddities like Luke Schenn somehow being on the ice for just over half of the Jets’ average for shot attempts — but twice the amount of real goals against — per minute. The second is that Samberg and DeMelo have been Winnipeg’s first option over the boards at the start of a penalty kill, meaning a higher percentage of their minutes have come against top power-play units.

So is Samberg a goal-preventing freak of nature? Is Stanley a disproportionate problem?

It is true, based on video analysis, that opposing teams found success isolating Stanley down low and taking advantage of his slower first step, but his expected goals numbers are not as concerning as Fleury’s. Pionk also comes off well in terms of expected goals, despite criticisms of his five-on-five defending. Then there is Morrissey, whose expected goals numbers are no better than the Jets’ average but whose results in terms of real goals are almost as good as it gets. Samberg isn’t all magic, all the time — his presence on the ice wasn’t enough to stop Brock Boeser from making a perfect deflection on Tuesday — but his long-term results have been quality.

What else explains these metrics?

I tend to believe forwards have more of an impact on the other team’s shot volume, as far as penalty killing goes, while defencemen have more of an impact on shot quality — as measured by distance from goal. A power play will shoot once it’s found a lane it wants. This takes puck movement such that the penalty-killing forwards are not in the initial shooting lane. From there, rebounds and other chances from close to the net are about boxouts, stick tie-ups and battles won in the slot. This isn’t a hard and fast rule, of course — lots of teams run plays that start down low and result in shots only if they beat the defencemen down low.

Even in those situations — for a Jets example, consider Gabriel Vilardi stepping across the net from beside it — the resulting shot comes from closer to the net. This shows up in terms of shot quality: Distance from goal is the No. 1 factor influencing public measures like expected goals or high-danger scoring chances. If a defenceman is going to stop a play like that — or its ensuing rebound attempt — then they need to make a good read, have great stick positioning, tie up a net-front forward, or some combination of the three. Morrissey’s quickness and reads are as good as it gets, even if he gives up strength in some of his net-front battles. DeMelo’s reads are good but his size is lacking. Stanley’s reads (or his feet) are the slowest of the bunch. We’ll see how Schenn’s performance develops but I’ve come to trust his reads and battles to the point of believing his startling goals-against number will trend better as the sample size grows.

Samberg combines reads, physicality, net-front success and shot blocks. His good health, combined with Schenn’s arrival, gives the Jets top options on the left and the right. Pionk and DeMelo will also factor into the playoff equation, meaning there’s only one question mark left: Who slots in behind Samberg on the left side?

I think the Jets are going to take a long look at using Morrissey in that role, adding to his already impressive body of work at five-on-five and the power play. We talk about his year-over-year improvements and credit his offensive explosion; I think Morrissey is still developing new ways to help the Jets win hockey games. Sign Samberg long-term this summer and Winnipeg’s left side is golden for years to come.

In the meantime, the 15th-ranked PK needs to maintain its upward trajectory to prove it’s not a liability come playoff time.

More people should be talking about Arniel for the Jack Adams

I tend to think of the Jack Adams Award as the NHL’s way of celebrating coaches on teams that dramatically outperformed expectations. A quick look at the front-runners for this year’s award — Spencer Carbery in Washington and Dean Evason in Columbus — implies the NHL is taking the same approach with its thinking for 2025. Whether you look at Vegas odds or our own staff predictions, Carbery is the prohibitive favourite, Evason is next, and everybody else is a great distance behind. I think that dramatically undersells Scott Arniel’s success in Winnipeg.

When this season began, I believed the power play would take a step forward, the five-on-five play would take a step back, and the Jets would be a playoff team even if last year’s 110 points were tough to match. The Jets are tied with Washington atop the NHL standings and on pace for 116 points. Forget about a modest step forward — Davis Payne’s power play has been spectacular — and forget about a modest step back: Winnipeg’s five-on-five play is even better than it was last season.

Arniel isn’t responsible for everything that’s gone well in Winnipeg. His decision to hire Payne for the power play has been the biggest part of the Jets’ Presidents’ Trophy run. He’s also built upon a foundation he helped establish with Rick Bowness at the helm and benefitted from a quality roster built by Kevin Cheveldayoff. But he’s also been at the helm of perhaps the single best season in Jets history. He has a hand in the power play, personnel decisions and five-on-five success. I’d also argue Washington’s stunning turnaround has more to do with management than Winnipeg’s does; the Capitals bought low on Pierre-Luc Dubois and picked up Logan Thompson to be their starting goaltender for a pair of third-round picks, among other moves, while the Jets largely stood pat in the offseason.

The Jets’ biggest change was letting Dillon go and promoting Samberg in his place. Go back further, of course, and Cheveldayoff’s work on the Andrew Copp, Dubois to Los Angeles, Niederreiter and Namestnikov trades — as well as the Hellebuyck and Mark Scheifele extensions — puts his fingerprints all over the team’s success. Looking at this particular season, though, and if there’s an award for which the Capitals should be a mortal lock, it’s the Jim Gregory GM of the Year award and not the Jack Adams.

That’s not to say Carbery doesn’t deserve credit or to diminish Evason’s remarkable work on Columbus. I just see Arniel as an obvious companion for them in the top three, despite a lack of leaguewide acclaim, and voted as such in our latest predictions piece.

Perfetti looks playoff-ready. What about the rest of the second line?

I reject the premise that Cole Perfetti’s step forward directly coincides with his comments about wanting to become “a prick” to play against.

When we detailed the how of Perfetti’s battle-winning — highlighting the way he initiates contact, getting into the hands of his opponent so as to win the puck with small-area quickness — it was based on a one-on-one conversation with Perfetti from early January. Despite starting 2025 with two assists in 10 games, Perfetti had clearly taken a step forward in his all-around play — one that depended on the eye test as opposed to the box score.

Perfetti is fourth in team scoring in Winnipeg’s last 20 games, with seven goals and 10 assists since Jan. 24, marking a top-six arrival during a high-stakes time of year wherein critics say he’s not supposed to be able to produce. I’ve been arguing that this is a realistic trajectory for Perfetti’s career since the offseason and I continue to project him as a top-six forward with No. 1 power-play potential through the heart of his career. (He’s already Nikolaj Ehlers’ replacement whenever Ehlers has been unavailable on the Jets’ top unit and has been productive in that role.)

Even in Vancouver, Arniel appreciated the trio’s work.

“Perfetti’s line was outstanding,” he said, naming the line by its left wing. But what does it mean for Winnipeg’s playoff push?

The Jets will depend on Kyle Connor, Scheifele and Vilardi — Nos. 1, 2 and 3 in team scoring — to drive results while giving Lowry the shutdown assignment against opposing top lines. Scheifele’s been the most consistent playoff performer by far with 38 points in 42 games compared to 32 points in 45 games for Connor and eight points in 12 games for Vilardi.

Perfetti was limited to a single game against Colorado last year, while Ehlers’ 14 points in 37 playoff games and Namestnikov’s 14 points in 57 playoff games leaves every member of Winnipeg’s second line with a lot to prove. They’re supposed to struggle to get to the middle of the ice as the quality of competition ramps up; they’ve also created a pile of scoring chances and won their minutes down the stretch. Continued success from Perfetti’s line would tilt matchups against most opponents firmly in Winnipeg’s favour. The degree to which Perfetti, 23, can limit his playoff growing pains could be the determining factor in his line’s performance.

(Photo of Dylan Samberg and Cole Perfetti: Stephen Brashear / Imagn Images)