A healthy Winnipeg Jets roster is not one to mess with.
On Friday night, for the first time in a long time, a full roster of Jets talent snuffed out the Dallas Stars' flame. The Jets showed up angry, scored early and often, and tied the best-of-seven series at ones with a decisive 4-0 shutout victory at home.
For Hellebuyck, it was a rebound performance and his fourth career postseason shutout.
“It is always great when you get the lead and just play your game and trust your game," he said post-game. "That being said, it was a full 60 tonight. We didn’t put the brakes on at all and couldn’t take a break, and I thought we did just that.”
Winnipeg came out firing on all cylinders following its Game 1 loss just two nights prior.
A four-minute double minor to Tyler Seguin was exactly what Winnipeg needed to get the game's opening goal. It came off the stick of Gabe Vilardi, who beat Jake Oettinger 3:35 into the contest.
Then, it was Nikolaj Ehlers who doubled the Jets' lead. This one wasn't anywhere near as pretty. But as they say, they don't ask how, they just ask how many.
Ehlers banked his centering pass to Mark Scheifele off of Radek Faksa and into the net, bringing the home crowd to its collective feet once again.
The Jets controlled the pace of play throughout the entire first period and did not hold back in the second. Winnipeg nearly scored two more in the early stages of the middle stanza, but a crossbar and last-second stick lift held the deficit to two goals.
Adam Lowry extended the Jets' lead to three on the heels of a heavy forechecking shift by the team's meat and potatoes line. He banked home a Dylan DeMelo point shot, putting a third puck past Oettinger.
The Jets held a 3-0 lead and a slight 19-16 shot lead through 40 minutes and managed to shut down the Stars in the third, mucking and grinding out the third period.
The Stars pulled Oettinger very early, and the Jets made them pay with Ehlers' second of the game. He outmuscled the visitors for the puck, turned and fired it the length of the ice into the empty net, sealing the deal for Winnipeg.
Hellebuyck finished the night with saves on all 22 Stars shots he faced, while Oettinger turned aside 21 of the 24 pucks sent on net by the Jets.
“It’s what he does every night for us," Morrissey said of his goaltender. "He’s an incredible goaltender. You know, he makes very difficult saves look very easy, routinely and often. You could tell he was feeling it tonight. When he’s feeling it like that, it gives the players in front of him, defencemen, forwards a lot of confidence. We’d like to cut down on some of those chances near the end of the second period, but he was feeling it, clearly. He’s done that all year, he’s done that for a long time. We rely on him, sometimes too much, but he was incredible tonight.”
The series will now shift to Dallas, where the two teams will face off in Games 3 and 4 on Sunday afternoon and Tuesday evening, respectively.
"We’re still playing hockey and it’s May. So, that’s fun," Hellebuyck laughed. "It’s the best time of year because you’ve dialed your game in all year long and you’re just going out and playing hockey and having fun.”