Ducks lose in frustrating blowout to Jets for their fifth straight loss
WINNIPEG, Canada — Tyler Toffoli scored his first two goals with Winnipeg and Laurent Brossoit stopped 21 shots for his second shutout of the season in the Jets’ 6-0 win over the Ducks on Friday night.
Jets defenseman Dylan DeMelo snapped a 63-game goal-scoring drought and added an assist, and Kyle Connor, Nate Schmidt and Mason Appleton also scored for Winnipeg. Josh Morrissey had three assists and Nikolaj Ehlers added two for the Jets, who’ve alternated wins and losses in their last five games.
Toffoli was playing his third game with the Jets since being acquired from New Jersey at the trade deadline.
“Definitely a special moment and, obviously, nice to get my first one here and hopefully keep rolling,” said Toffoli, who has 28 goals and 46 points in 64 games. “I should have had four or five there by the end of it. ... We played really well. It was just a matter of time before we started kind of piling some on.”
The victory moved Winnipeg into a three-way tie with Dallas and Colorado atop the Central Division. The Jets have the tiebreaker for first place, having played two fewer games than the Stars and one fewer than the Avalanche.
Marc-Andre Fleury made 16 saves in his 75th career shutout to lead the Minnesota Wild to a 2-0 victory over the Ducks.
Brossoit’s shutout was his fifth straight victory as a starter and he improved to 12-4-2. He hasn’t given up a goal in 141 minutes 40 seconds, dating to last Friday’s 3-0 shutout of Seattle and a 5-2 victory over Buffalo on March 3.
“It’s feeling pretty good and then, obviously, the team in front of me,” Brossoit said. “I’m going to try not to get too high on these because you know the opponents that I was playing in those two [shutouts].”
John Gibson stopped 32 shots for the Ducks, who have lost five straight and were coming off a 2-0 loss at Minnesota on Thursday. They have been outscored 27-5 during the skid.
“It starts with me,” Ducks forward Troy Terry said. “We’ve just got to start getting more offense. We can’t keep making excuses for injuries and missing guys.”
Ducks coach Greg Cronin agreed scoring is in short supply.
“We won’t shoot the puck. We won’t do it,” Cronin said. “It’s been an ongoing problem. And when we do shoot it, we don’t get it through. It hits a stick or a shin pad and goes the other direction.”
Winnipeg led 1-0 after the first period and 2-0 following the second.
Gibson denied Mark Scheifele from in close about seven minutes into the first. Scheifele was back in action on his 31st birthday after missing the previous game with the flu.
The Ducks went on the first power play less than a minute later, but Frank Vatrano hit the crossbar.
Connor made it 1-0 with his 28th goal when he tipped in a point-blank shot by DeMelo with 3:40 left in the first.
Winnipeg’s first man advantage was a hit, with Schmidt’s shot bouncing off two Ducks’ skates before going past Gibson at 7:47 of the second.
DeMelo’s low shot made it 3-0 at 4:59 of the third. It was his second goal of the season — and first since Oct. 14 in Winnipeg’s second game.
Toffoli scored twice in just under three minutes, including one of the power play, to widen the lead to 5-0 with 8:55 remaining. He’s up to 28 goals.
Appleton added a power-play marker with six seconds remaining.
Jets coach Rick Bowness gave an update about forward Gabe Vilardi after the morning skate and it wasn’t good news. Further tests revealed Vilardi, who was out because of an upper-body injury, has an enlarged spleen and there’s no timetable for his return, Bowness said. The former King has missed the last eight games and won’t be on the upcoming five-game trip. He’s played only 38 of 66 games because of injuries.
Up next for the Ducks: at St. Louis Blues on Sunday night to finish a four-game trip.
