Nyquist scores 1st of season, Jets hand Lightning 4th straight loss
Nyquist then scored his first goal as a Jet to push it to 3-1 at 5:34. Pearson created a turnover in the Lightning zone that allowed Jonathan Toews to find Nyquist in the slot, and he beat Vasilevskiy high glove side with a wrist shot.
“I know it’s been a long time coming,” Nyquist said. “Overall, I thought we played a really good game all throughout. And then, obviously, they came out with a push in the third and got the early goal on the power play. So it’s nice to put that goal in for 3-1.”
Connor appeared to make it 4-1 at 8:43, but the goal was disallowed after Tampa Bay challenged the play and video review determined Scheifele was offside on the 2-on-1 rush with Connor.
“That’s part of what we talked about coming out of the break,” Arniel said. “Playing forward instead of sitting back and letting teams like that, that are so offensively dangerous, come at you. I just thought our pressure, we were really good with our five-man units, whether it was defending in our end or whether that was attacking in the neutral zone or our forecheck.”
Scheifele then set up Connor to score into an empty net at 17:59 for the 4-1 final.
“There was no chance I was shooting another puck the rest of the game. I was going to do everything in my power to get him that goal back because I was so mad at myself. I was very angry with myself there. That is a loss of focus,” Scheifele said. “You should never go offside in that situation — you should never go offside in general, really. I’m going to hear about that one … from a lot of my buddies, trust me. It won’t be a fun conversation or text I’ll be getting from some of the guys. But yeah, I wasn’t going to shoot another puck until ‘KC’ got one.”
NOTES: Nyquist’s first goal as a member of the Jets comes in his 40th game of his 13th NHL season (one goal, nine assists), after the 36-year-old signed a one-year, $3.25 million contract with Winnipeg on July 2, 2025. His last NHL goal came Apr. 11, 2025 as a member of the Minnesota Wild. … The Jets recalled defenseman Isaak Phillips from Manitoba of the American Hockey League on Thursday prior to puck drop. Phillips had two hits in 12:10 of ice time, skating in his third NHL game this season. … Winnipeg defenseman Ville Heinola led the first unit power play and had a hit and blocked a shot in 13:51 of ice time, skating in his third NHL game this season. … Koepke assisted on Barron’s goal to set a new single-season career high for assists (eight). … Prior to puck drop, Winnipeg defensemen Luke Schenn and Logan Stanley were healthy scratched.
