Lowry's tiebreaking goal sends Jets to 3-2 win over Ducks
Adam Lowry scored the tiebreaking goal with 9:13 to play and the Winnipeg Jets made progress in the playoff race with a 3-2 victory over the Anaheim Ducks on Thursday night.
Kyle Connor scored his 28th goal and Connor Hellebuyck made 18 saves for the Jets, who opened a three-game California road trip with their third victory in four games.
After Frank Vatrano tied it for Anaheim early in the third with a power-play goal, Lowry put the Jets back ahead with a short redirection of a pass from Brenden Dillon for his third goal in four games.
"That's our group," said Connor, who snapped his 11-game goal drought in the second period. "We're a resilient type, no matter what we face. We have confidence in here in each other that we'll get out of it, and it's going to make us stronger. Especially coming down to the playoffs, you know you're not going to win every game, so you've got to deal with those situations when they happen.
"It's no quit in here from everybody."
Mason Appleton scored the first goal for Winnipeg, which has beaten Anaheim in five straight meetings, including a three-game sweep this season.
Winnipeg is in the second wild-card slot in the Western Conference with 85 points and nine games to play, one point behind Seattle. Nashville, which beat the Kraken in a shootout earlier Thursday, is five points behind the Jets, but the Predators have three games in hand.
"It's no secret," Lowry said. "We know where we're at and how critical these games are. We can only control our play, but we're going to try to carry this momentum into Saturday."
Cam Fowler also scored and Lukas Dostal stopped 30 shots for the lottery-bound Ducks, who dropped to 1-4-1 on their eight-game homestand with their third consecutive defeat.
Fowler scored his career-best 43rd point with a goal in the first period on a knuckling shot that threaded a path among three Anaheim teammates.
"He's been unbelievable," Anaheim coach Dallas Eakins said of Fowler. "I hope that he's proud of himself to have a career year in a year like this. ... He does a lot of things for us, and especially now he carries a lot of ice time. He's a leader in our dressing room. He basically does it all, so we're all real proud of Cam."
Appleton evened it 45 seconds later and Connor then scored late in the second period on remarkably similar plays, knocking in loose pucks after rebounds trickled underneath Dostal.
Connor is Winnipeg's leading scorer, but he hadn't scored a goal in March, and he had gone scoreless in a season-high six consecutive games.
"It's something to build on," Connor said. "We have nine games left now, and we want to continue to move forward improving, and hit the playoffs with a running stride here."
Vatrano tied it with a low shot from the blue line while Derek Grant screened Hellebuyck in a rare mistake by the Jets' second-ranked penalty killers. The goal was Vatrano's 18th of the season, matching his total in each of the past two seasons with Florida and the Rangers.
UP NEXT
Jets: At Los Angeles on Saturday.
Ducks: Host St. Louis on Saturday.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
BREAKING Legendary hockey broadcaster Bob Cole dies at 90: CBC
Bob Cole, a welcome voice for Canadian hockey fans for a half-century, has died at the age of 90. Cole died Wednesday night in St. John's, N.L., surrounded by his family, his daughter, Megan Cole, told the CBC.
MPP Sarah Jama asked to leave Ontario legislature for wearing keffiyeh
MPP Sarah Jama was asked to leave the Legislative Assembly of Ontario by House Speaker Ted Arnott on Thursday for wearing a keffiyeh, a garment that is banned at Queen’s Park.
2 teens charged in Halifax homicide: police
Two teenagers have been charged with second-degree murder in connection to an alleged homicide near the Halifax Shopping Centre earlier this week.
Here's why Harvey Weinstein's New York rape conviction was tossed and what happens next
Here's what you need to know about why movie mogul Harvey Weinstein's rape conviction was thrown out and what happens next.
12-year-old hippo in Japan raised as a male discovered to be a female
When Gen-chan arrived at a zoo in Japan in 2017, no one questioned whether the then-five-year-old hippopotamus was a boy. Seven years later, zoo staff made a surprising discovery: Gen-chan, now 12, was female.
Honda to get up to $5B in govt help for EV battery, assembly plants
Honda is set to build an electric vehicle battery plant next to its Alliston, Ont., assembly plant, which it is retooling to produce fully electric vehicles, all part of a $15-billion project that is expected to include up to $5 billion in public money.
'Deep ignorance': Calls for Manitoba trustee to resign sparked after comments about Indigenous people and reconciliation
A rural Manitoba school trustee is facing calls to resign over comments he made about Indigenous people and residential schools earlier this week.
CTE: Researchers believe widespread brain injury may contribute to veteran suicide rate
Researchers are working to better understand if some Canadian military veterans may be suffering from Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy, also known as CTE -- a disorder previously found in the brains of professional football and hockey players after their death.
1 arrested in northern Alberta during public shelter order
Residents of John D'Or Prairie, a community on the Little Red River Cree Nation in northern Alberta, were told to take shelter Thursday morning during a police operation.