WINNIPEG, Manitoba -- Will the real Winnipeg Jets please stand up?
That's the question on the minds of Winnipeg hockey fans as their team continues to tease them with inconsistent play.
One day, they're putting the finishing touches on their first three-game winning streak of the season -- a troika of victories over Chicago, St. Louis and Dallas. The next, they're sleep-walking through a clunker of a loss against the worst team in the league -- by far -- the Colorado Avalanche.
For a team gunning for one of the two wild-card playoff spots in the Western Conference, it's points like the two left on the table in Denver that has Jets fans wringing their hands.
Coach Paul Maurice told the Winnipeg Free Press his troops need to adopt a defense-first mindset if they're going to grind out wins on nights when they don't have their best stuff.
"We've got an awful lot of guys scoring goals feeling pretty good about their numbers and most of them, or all of them, didn't come to the National Hockey League as defensive players," he said.
"There's a theme running through our last games. We've played a different style of team so that the trading of chances is there, that defensively we've got lots of room to improve and appreciation for the quality of defense you need to play nightly can get better."
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