For the Winnipeg Jets the unfortunate injury to Pekka Rinne could be a blessing or a hinderance. Last Sunday versus the Predators the Jets in the normally emotional and boisterous MTS Centre the Jets had more than enough trouble solving the riddle that was Carter Hutton, in fact he had the Jets rather twister around.

The task does not change tonight for the Jets and that may be a good thing. They should all have had nightmares of yet another back up stoning them. At times it became a trend for the Jets in their inaugural season to see back up goalies. Now it seems plausible that this is a regular event for a team that has scored only 25 goals, albeit good for 14th overall in the league.

The problem is when you look at the other side of the goal equation, the team still allows more than they score having given up 29. Not to worry this piece will not turn into a Pavelec therapy session. Overall the Jets are allowing too many shots compared to what they are shooting but more importantly are they doing enough to control play?

I'm not going to quantify this with numbers and fancy statistics because I'm usually not smart enough to make sense of them all. So I'll look at shots as they are recorded: this team is all over the map with shots and results. All three of Pavelec's wins have been when the team has been outshot. Oops... this is becoming about Pavelec.

So let's go back to controlling play- do they know what to do to control it? Against the Caps we saw a much better effort to do the little things, to make the game harder for the opposition and easier for the Jets. There were building blocks and positives everywhere even if the result was not a win.

The question now becomes this: can the players remember what they did to improve their game and repeat it?

Against a division rival with the same amount of games played (10) and one more win with 7 fewer goals scored and 6 fewer allowed this opportunity cannot be wasted, again.

The comments about emotion on the Jets bench came from the Preds and if there was ever a team that might need some 'bulletin board' material the Jets are it. This game represents the start of a 4 game road trip and an ugly next ten games of opposition. Building on a good effort, even one with some warts, is paramount when your schedule looks like this:

@ Preds
@ Stars
@ Avs
@ Blues
Blackhawks

Red Wings
@ Blackhawks
Preds
Sharks
@ Detroit

As Claude Noel has broken the season down into 16 five game series which one of the above do you think the Jets can win? They barely came close to .500 with 8 of the first 10 games at home so what does the road record look like? To date, including the game this season the Jets are 26-34-7 on the road a .440 road record. That has to change and it starts tonight against the Preds.

Below is a look at the Jets after 10 games as an info graphic.

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