ANALYSIS: Can Jets’ Scheifele maintain inspired level of play?
Mark Scheifele is clearly motivated to have a great start to his 13th full NHL season.
Earning an invite to the Canadian men’s Olympic hockey team would be an obvious reason for that inspired play. But there might be another factor spurring on the veteran Winnipeg Jets centre.
Scheifele’s first-period goal in the 4-1 win over Nashville Saturday night made it official: The first-ever draft pick of the Jets 2.0 is now the franchise’s all-time points leader with 813 — one more than longtime linemate Blake Wheeler amassed in his 897 games for Atlanta and Winnipeg.
Number 55 has mentioned more than once that the record he would really like to surpass is the 929 points former coach and mentor Dale Hawerchuk tallied for the original 1.0 version of the Jets. And there is not much doubt he’ll do that next season if he remains healthy.
And if he avoids father time.
Scheifele will celebrate his 33rd birthday in March. Maybe that’s why a panel of ESPN hockey experts chose Winnipeg’s No. 1 centre as a candidate for “regression” from his 39-goal and 87-point campaign in 2024-25.
To be fair, the NHL’s U.S. TV broadcast partner felt a step back from the 25 power-play points Scheifele put on the board would be the biggest single factor in a 10 per cent or more decrease in offensive production for the Jets’ star pivot.
But for an athlete who looks after his body the way Scheifele does — and is as driven to improve and succeed as Scheifele is — just the mere mention of “regressing” or losing a step might almost draw a four-letter response from the very religious man who never swears, even in the heat of battle.
Just for the record, Manitobans Morgan Geekie of Strathclair and Mark Stone of Winnipeg also made ESPN’s “likely to regress” list, along with Matt Duchene of Dallas, Tampa Bay’s Brandon Hagel and Aliaksei Protas of Washington.
It will be interesting to see how many of those players do experience a year-to-year 10 per cent or more drop-off in production.
But the smart money says Mark Scheifele won’t be one of them.
globalnews
