GAMEDAY: Golden Knights at Jets

WINNIPEG – The Winnipeg Jets are hoping that some home cooking can keep their playoff hopes alive when they host the Vegas Golden Knights at Canada Life Centre.

The Jets have not had a lot of success against Vegas going 1-6-3 in their last ten meetings including a 5-4 overtime loss here in Winnipeg at the beginning of 2026.

“They’re always – they have been and they still are – one of the elite teams in the league. Not too far removed from being a Stanley Cup champion. They still have a lot of those pieces in place,” said head coach Scott Arniel.

“(Bruce Cassidy) does a fantastic job year after year of them dialling in. They’re a big, heavy team and they obviously have some top-end skill. They’re specialty teams are fourth and seventh on the power play and the penalty kill.” 

The Jets went 1-1-1 on their eastern road trip but still remain five points out of a playoff spot in the west. They have got a lot of help on the out-of-town scoreboard as Seattle has lost three straight, San Jose has dropped four in a row and Los Angeles can’t find consistency either.

“I mean, you know, I think at the end of the day, I kind of said it, and sound like a broken record, we're just trying to control what we can control. I mean, we can't, we have no impact on the other team's games and just trying to collect wins,” said Dylan DeMelo.

“And we've been fortunate enough when we've lost, everybody else has lost or we haven't lost ground when we've lost some games. But we're just trying to get points, which are trying to get wins and hopefully we can keep climbing here.”

Make sure to watch the Jets pregame show at 12:30 CT with Sara and Jamie.

Something that has added to the Jets defensive game has been the return of veteran defenceman Neal Pionk, who came back in Pittsburgh and played 22:30 against the Penguins and 25:27 against the Rangers.

“It has been great. You saw that immediate impact when he was thrown into the Pittsburgh game, and that is tough to do, thrown into a back-to-back coming back from injury,” said Kyle Connor.

“The pace was there and he was impactful physically, throwing his body around and obviously he scores a goal. He has that offensive ability that can create so much, and it is great to have him back that right shot there and he elevates everybody's game to the next level.”

Pionk will begin the night with Josh Morrissey, Arniel is going right back to Connor Hellebuyck after another solid performance from Eric Comrie on Sunday. Hellebuyck has posted strong numbers against Vegas in his career, holding a .910 career save percentage with two shutouts in the matchup.

"I was coming back to Helle here against Vegas at home. With the goaltending, they’ve got to give us a chance to win every night and they usually do," said Arniel.

"Coms was real good, as was Helle there. We’ll just move it game to game and see where we are. Coms will have an opportunity down the road here.”

The Jets have five games remaining at Canada Life Centre this season, holding a 17-13-6 record at home. The Jets need three more wins to record their eighth consecutive season with 20 or more home wins (Excluding 2020-21 season). Winnipeg’s last time failing to reach 20 home wins in an 82-game season came in 2015-16, where the team went 18-19-4. 

Puck drop is scheduled for 7 CT.