GAMEDAY: Jets at Golden Knights (Game 1)

The day has finally arrived, but the Winnipeg Jets and Vegas Golden Knights still have to wait a few more hours before their best-of-seven first round series officially begins.
"No matter what you do, no matter how many games you've played in this league, or how many Cups you've won, that first period of a playoff series - everyone is nervous," said Jets head coach Rick Bowness. "Everyone tonight, on both teams, is going to be nervous. You just have to play your way through it."
All the preparations have been done - even with the Golden Knights announcing that captain, and Winnipegger, Mark Stone will return to their line-up tonight for Game One after recovering a back surgery from earlier in the season.
"We found enough clips of him," Bowness laughed. "He played against us earlier in the season. We know he's a great hockey player and he's got a great stick, and he's very reliable at both ends of the ice."

On Winnipeg's injured list, two names have been officially titled as game-time decisions by Bowness: Nikolaj Ehlers and Kevin Stenlund.

Ehlers was a full participant in Monday's practice at T-Mobile Arena, while Stenlund skated for the first time since last Thursday's regular season finale during Winnipeg's optional skate on Tuesday.
"I just want to feel good on the ice. I had a couple days off and that helped me," said Stenlund, who sustained a lower-body injury while scoring a shorthanded goal against the Avalanche.
"There is a lot of excitement. It's going to be a fun stretch."
While a major storyline coming into the series is that there are 14 players combined on the two rosters that played against each other in the 2018 Western Conference Final, Mark Scheifele feels that there is enough roster turnover that the series has a much different feel.
Scheifele, who finished the season with a career-high of 42 goals (including one in each of his last three games), wants to see the Jets start quickly in front of a hostile crowd.
"Not letting them come at us, but us coming at them," said Scheifele. "That's the biggest thing. We have to ready right from the first puck drop and know they're going to be excited playing in front of their home fans, and it's going to be a raucous building. We have to be ready right from the get-go."

With Ehlers and Stenlund listed as game-time decisions, the projected line-up is difficult to predict. David Gustafsson and Karson Kuhlman were the two forwards who came off the ice - instead of staying on for extra work - at the optional skate, so it would stand to reason that they'd be the players coming in if either Ehlers or Stenlund couldn't play.
If Ehlers and Stenlund draw in for Game One, expect the line-up to look like it did for much of the stretch drive of the regular season:
Connor-Dubois-Scheifele
Ehlers-Namestnikov-Wheeler
Niederreiter-Lowry-Appleton
Barron-Stenlund-Maenalanen
Morrissey-DeMelo
Dillon-Pionk
Samberg-Schmidt

The Golden Knights were 25-15-1 on home ice this season, putting them sixth amongst Western Conference teams. Winnipeg lost both games they played at T-Mobile Arena this season, and made the most of the few days after the 82nd game of the regular season to familiarize themselves with an opponent they haven't seen since mid-December.
"We're pretty familiar with Vegas and how they generate their offence," said Adam Lowry. "It's just about finding ways to slow them down. They're good in their transition, they've got a lot of speed. Try and use these few practices to our advantage and hopefully hit the ground running."
On top of the fact the Jets haven't seen Vegas in a few months, the Golden Knights also haven't seen the Jets with Nino Niederreiter and Vladislav Namestnikov in the line-up - outside of some film sessions.

"Our team looks a lot different," Lowry said, adding that the grind the Jets had to go through to punch their ticket to the postseason leaves them feeling battle-tested and confident ahead of tonight's puck drop.
"When we're hard forechecking, when we're running the right routes, we're a tough team to break out on, we're a tough team to stop on the cycle," Lowry said. "That's a key that we're going to try to continue. That's kind of been our bread and butter: sustained o-zone pressure, sustained o-zone time and kind of wearing the other team down."
And that's exactly the game Bowness wants to see his team get to, right from the drop of the puck.
"We kept emphasizing that it's more important how we play," Bowness said. "We have to play our game and we're at our best when we're skating and we're aggressive. That's our mindset going into the game."
Puck drop is set for 8:30 pm CT.
-- Mitchell Clinton, WinnipegJets.com
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