The Jets looked like they had it all put together for a playoff berth. Carolina faltered, the Jets made up ground and held a good lead in the division. Then the Washington Capitals won 16 of their final 20 games to snatch the #3 seed away from the Jets. They’re a team with the talent to make the playoffs but just had the worst kind of luck to cruelly deny them a postseason berth.
Team Name: Winnipeg Jets
Record: 24-21-3, 2nd in Southeast, No Playoffs
Player of the Season: It’s hard to pick just one, so we won’t. Andrew Ladd, Blake Wheeler and Evander Kane all deserve the honor. Ladd (18-28–46) led the team in scoring while Wheeler (19-22–41) topped the team in goals. Kane (17-16–33) filled the scoresheet and was the emotional leader. Those three were productive all season and really cleared the Jets for takeoff to the playoffs until Washington intervened.
Breakout of the Season: The whole team. The Jets showed they can run with the big boys and they should contend for a playoff spot in 2014.
Disappointment of the Season: Special teams undid them. Badly. They were dead last on the power play at 13.8% and their penalty kill was successful less than 80% of time which put them at 24th of 30 teams. In February, the Jets went 4-for-37 on the man advantage and followed it up with a 5-for-40 March and a 5-for-38 April.
Yeah, that won’t get it done. If they can be as competitive as they were with their power play weighing them down, imagine how good they could be if the Jets were even, say, middle-of-the-pack on the man advantage.
Team Analysis: The Jets have the talent. They get what looks like a favorable bounce in realignment (see below) and they have a pair of strong blueliners in Dustin Byfuglien and Tobias Enstrom. Enstrom missed 26 games with injury and a healthy Tobias makes the Funke family Jets a contender.
In net, Ondrej Pavelec was a horse making 43 starts but posting mediocre numbers (21-20-3, 2.80 GAA .905 save percentage) which keep him from moving up in the depth charts of fantasy netminders.
2013-2014 Story Lines: The Jets will say goodbye the old Southeast Division and get realigned into Division B in the Western Conference. They get to line up with Chicago, Colorado, Dallas, Minnesota, Nashville and St. Louis and the young, hungry Jets team could very well be a playoff team.
2013-2014 Fantasy Guys to Have: Ladd, Wheeler, Kane, Byfuglien, Enstrom
On the Fringe: Pavelec, Olli Jokinen (7-7–14 but a nasty -19 rating), Grant Clitsome (4-12–16 with a +10) and Bryan Little (7-25–32) and did a good job feeding the bigger guns. Think poor man’s Martin St. Louis and you get the idea.
| PLAYER | GP | G | A | PTS | +/- | PIM | ATOI | PPG | PPA | SHG | SHA | SOG | SPCT |
| Andrew Ladd, LW | 48 | 18 | 28 | 46 | 10 | 22 | 19:41 | 3 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 121 | 14.9 |
| Blake Wheeler, RW | 48 | 19 | 22 | 41 | -3 | 28 | 18:48 | 2 | 5 | 0 | 0 | 129 | 14.7 |
| Evander Kane, LW | 48 | 17 | 16 | 33 | -3 | 80 | 20:27 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 190 | 8.9 |
| Bryan Little, C | 48 | 7 | 25 | 32 | 8 | 4 | 19:48 | 2 | 3 | 0 | 1 | 84 | 8.3 |
| Dustin Byfuglien, D | 43 | 8 | 20 | 28 | -1 | 34 | 24:24 | 4 | 6 | 0 | 0 | 142 | 5.6 |
| Nik Antropov, RW | 40 | 6 | 12 | 18 | 6 | 16 | 15:57 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 56 | 10.7 |
| Grant Clitsome, D | 44 | 4 | 12 | 16 | 10 | 18 | 18:50 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 56 | 7.1 |
| Tobias Enstrom, D | 22 | 4 | 11 | 15 | -8 | 8 | 22:31 | 1 | 6 | 0 | 1 | 21 | 19.0 |
| Kyle Wellwood, C | 39 | 6 | 9 | 15 | 0 | 2 | 12:59 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 37 | 16.2 |
| Olli Jokinen, C | 45 | 7 | 7 | 14 | -19 | 14 | 17:08 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 85 | 8.2 |
| Zach Bogosian, D | 33 | 5 | 9 | 14 | -5 | 29 | 23:07 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 85 | 5.9 |
| Ron Hainsey, D | 47 | 0 | 13 | 13 | -8 | 10 | 22:52 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 52 | 0.0 |
| Alex Burmistrov, C | 44 | 4 | 6 | 10 | 0 | 14 | 15:38 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 55 | 7.3 |
| Paul Postma, D | 34 | 4 | 5 | 9 | -5 | 6 | 15:02 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 32 | 12.5 |
| James Wright, C | 38 | 2 | 3 | 5 | -5 | 31 | 11:36 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 32 | 6.3 |
| Antti Miettinen, RW | 22 | 3 | 2 | 5 | -3 | 2 | 12:39 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 26 | 11.5 |
| Chris Thorburn, RW | 42 | 2 | 2 | 4 | -5 | 70 | 6:19 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 13 | 15.4 |
| Mark Stuart, D | 42 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 5 | 53 | 16:42 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 40 | 5.0 |
| Eric Tangradi, LW† | 36 | 1 | 3 | 4 | -4 | 22 | 10:18 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 44 | 2.3 |
| Zach Redmond, D | 8 | 1 | 3 | 4 | 0 | 12 | 19:35 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 13 | 7.7 |
| Aaron Gagnon, C | 10 | 3 | 0 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 8:09 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 11 | 27.3 |
| Anthony Peluso, RW | 5 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 14 | 5:00 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 4 | 0.0 |
| Jim Slater, C | 26 | 1 | 1 | 2 | -3 | 19 | 10:27 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 22 | 4.5 |
| Alexei Ponikarovsky, LW† | 12 | 2 | 0 | 2 | -2 | 6 | 11:52 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 10 | 20.0 |
| Derek Meech, D | 16 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 14:42 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 5 | 0.0 |
| Mike Santorelli, C † | 10 | 0 | 1 | 1 | -5 | 0 | 13:43 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 14 | 0.0 |
| Mark Scheifele, C | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 11:32 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 6 | 0.0 |
| Patrice Cormier, C | 10 | 0 | 0 | 0 | -3 | 7 | 3:53 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 4 | 0.0 |
| PLAYER | GP | W | L | OTL | GAA | TOI | SV | SV% | SHO | TGA | TSA | PIM |
| Ondrej Pavelec | 44 | 21 | 20 | 3 | 2.80 | 2552:43 | 1132 | .905 | 0 | 119 | 1251 | 2 |
| Al Montoya | 7 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 2.90 | 351:21 | 151 | .899 | 1 | 17 | 168 | 0 |
