Growing as a team

WINNIPEG - With heightened outside expectations for the Winnipeg Jets this season, this year's edition of training camp has a whole new feel.

From the sounds of it, key players like Blake Wheeler and Mark Scheifele spent a portion of their summers together, in an effort to drive this team to the next step this season. Jets Head Coach Paul Maurice loves the message his leaders are sending to younger players.
"When Josh Morrissey breaks into the league he sees both the captain Blake Wheeler and Mark Scheifele and that's part of the way they do it," said Maurice.
"It started with training with Gary Roberts and the way they train. Also how they will search out other avenues whether its massage or nutrition, mental health. All of the things that they are willing to work on to become a better player."

One of those "avenues" to getting better was signing up with Hall-of-Famer Adam Oates and his highlighy-touted skill development program. Oates was in town earlier this week working with Scheifele and Wheeler amongst others at Bell MTS IcePlex. General Manager Kevin Cheveldayoff feels players showing up in Winnipeg well before the start of training camp is a sign of growth within the team and organization.
"When essentially 22-23 players were traded here from Atlanta they didn't have this kind of cohesiveness, they didn't have this kind of bonding, team leadership, team belief," said Cheveldayoff.
"It doesn't just happen overnight. It happens because you have individuals who care about their own self, their own abilities and pushing themselves to be the best. But it's not an individual sport. I think there were points in time where we had maybe 7 or 8 guys training together this summer prior to coming here and skating. That speaks a lot about the individuals and the closeness of the individuals."

Scheifele's attention to detail when it comes to his health and fitness has been well documented - but that went to a whole new level earlier this summer as the star forward was recently featured in GQ magazine. The article detailed the changes he made in his diet, which included eliminating gluten and dairy. His know-how when it comes to conditioning is something he is more than happy share with his teammates.
"I'm not going to go chasing guys, but guys here and there will ask me about certain things, nutrition things or certain training things," said Scheifele.
"I'm an open book with them so whenever a teammate or someone in the organization has a question I'm always open to helping them."