The most concerning elements of the Winnipeg Jets’ recent struggles

A team that was once leading the league standings is on a bad streak heading toward the playoffs.

The Winnipeg Jets are on a six-game losing streak and have seemingly fallen out of contention to finish first in the Central Division, a spot they have held, or at least been near, for the majority of the season.

While the Jets have lost to playoff contenders like the Edmonton Oilers and Vegas Golden Knights over this slide, they have also dropped games to teams outside the playoff picture, including the New Jersey Devils and Ottawa Senators.

While the odds favor the Jets returning to the playoffs for the first time since 2021, they are certainly not giving anyone confidence that they can make a deep run. Winnipeg (44-24-6) is third in the Central, six points behind the Colorado Avalanche for second, but only four ahead of the fourth-place Nashville Predators.

On Monday’s edition of Daily Faceoff LIVE, Winnipeg Sports Talk’s Andrew Paterson joined Frank Seravalli and Tyler Yaremchuk to explain the most concerning trend in the Jets’ downfall.

Andrew Paterson: The power play has been a disaster. I think it was 19-straight where they hadn’t popped one with the man advantage. The penalty kill has regressed after a pretty nice start to the second half of the season.

It’s pretty hard not to look at what is going on now with the Winnipeg Jets. In particular, this half-dozen games where they’ve gone without a win, and not look directly at the top line. Mark Scheifele, not even two weeks ago against the New York Rangers, looked like he was channeling 2018 Playoffs Mark Scheifele…since then, it has been a trainwreck. I think Kyle Connor is minus-10 in his last 10 games, Scheifele is minus-seven. We can talk about the depth of the team…there’s not many teams in the National Hockey League that can win consistently, getting killed when their top line is on the ice.

You can watch the entire segment and full episode here…