For Parker Ford, you couldn’t have scripted it any better.
Playing in his first career NHL game in Boston, the Wakefield, Rhode Island native tallied his first NHL goal as the Winnipeg Jets took down the Bruins 6-2 for their fifth straight win.
It was a night Ford won’t soon forget. After getting called up from the AHL’s Manitoba Moose less than 24 hours earlier, Ford scored his first career goal, in his first NHL game, on his first shot on net, in front of friends and family just a few hours down the road from where he grew up.
Ford is just the eighth player in Jets/Thrashers franchise history to score in his NHL debut, joining a list that includes the likes of Nikita Chibrikov, Sami Niku, Patrik Laine, Nic Petan, John Albert, Jacob Trouba and Bryan Little.
“Just blacked out a little bit, but, yeah, it was great,” said Ford. “I think I was just really focusing on playing my game tonight and helping the team win. Now I can go see the fam and celebrate a little bit.”
Ford’s services were required after Morgan Barron was placed on injured reserve as he’s out week-to-week.
Ford said he had between 10-20 friends and family members make the short drive to see his debut.
“My whole life I’ve wanted to do this for my family,” he said. “And it’s probably going to be emotional when I go see them here.”
Mark Scheifele scored a pair of goals as he hit the 30-goal plateau for the fourth time of his career. Scheifele also tied Ilya Kovalchuk’s franchise record for most career goals with the team with his 328th as a Jet.
“Obviously, a huge honour,” Scheifele said. “Obviously, very, very special and obviously he was a fantastic player and like I’ve said before, I’ve played with some pretty fantastic players that set me up in those positions, so, it all goes to them.
“It’s very humbling. You grow up as a kid obviously hoping to play in the NHL one day and obviously to reflect on that, it’s pretty special.”
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Vladislav Namestnikov, Nikolaj Ehlers and Kyle Connor scored the other goals for Winnipeg.
The Jets got out to an early two-goal lead in the first period. The Bruins tied the game just 11 seconds into the third, but the Jets scored four unanswered goals to secure the win, including markers less than a minute apart to all but seal up the victory.
“I loved our first period,” said Jets head coach Scott Arniel. “That was way better than Montreal and we knew that Boston was going to be a little ornery after what happened the other night in Buffalo. They came out but I liked the way we played.
“We didn’t let them get into a rush game. We did a good job of kinda hemming them in their end. We scored early which was big and when you do that on the road, it gets the opposition on their heels.”
The Jets made one other change as Arniel pulled Haydn Fleury out of the lineup in favour of Colin Miller after using the same six defencemen for the previous four games.
Just over a minute into the game, Brad Marchand took a cross-checking penalty that sent Winnipeg’s league-best power play to work.
The first unit couldn’t get the job done, but the second unit did at the 2:55 mark of the period.
The puck found its way to Nino Niederreiter in front of the net, he tried to go between his legs to put a shot on goal but the puck slid through his legs and right to Namestnikov for a tap-in to open the scoring.
Winnipeg thought they had a second goal on the board just a few minutes later when Josh Morrissey wired a slapshot past Joonas Korpisalo in transition but Cole Perfetti was clearly offside on the play. Boston challenged it and after a very swift review, the goal was taken off the board.
The Jets were unfazed, however, taking a 2-0 lead for real at the 11:31 mark when a Neal Pionk point shot was deftly deflected by Scheifele and through Korpisalo’s five-hole for Scheifele’s 30th goal of the season.
Boston got back in the game late in the period when Marchand ripped a shot on the power play that beat Connor Hellebuyck through a screen, making it 2-1 after 20 minutes.
Neither team found the back of the net in the second period as each team failed on a power play chance. Boston outshot Winnipeg 11-10 after the Jets had an 11-9 advantage in that category in the first.
Right before the end of the second, Marchand was called for interference, giving Winnipeg 1:57 of power play time to start the third but Boston turned the tables on the Jets in the opening seconds of the period.
A blunder by Morrissey in his own end led to a great chance by Boston which Hellebuyck stopped, freezing the puck for a whistle. But on the ensuing faceoff, Pavel Zacha won the draw right to Elias Lindholm, who wired a shot past Hellebuyck to tie the game 11 seconds into the third.
Any momentum that the Bruins could have generated from the shorthanded tally was quickly dismissed thanks to Scheifele, who put the Jets back in front just 24 seconds later.
He skated the puck through the neutral zone before sending a pass to Ehlers inside the Bruins blueline. Ehlers then sent it back to Scheifele as he darted through the slot, beating Korpisalo high to restore Winnipeg’s advantage.
The chaotic start to the third continued when Ehlers got in on the fun just 42 seconds later. Mason Lohrei attempted to skate the puck out from behind the Boston net and cut inside toward the crease, but Ehlers was there to poke the puck off Lohrei’s stick and into the net with Korpisalo slow to get back in position.
The storybook moment for Ford came at the 5:57 mark of the third. Logan Stanley was first to a loose puck along the wall in Boston’s end, skating it down below the goal line before sending a pass in front to Alex Iafallo. The puck bounced away from Iafallo but right to the stick of Ford, who knocked it home for his first NHL goal as his teammates along with friends and family in attendance shot to their feet in joyous celebration.
Winnipeg more or less cruised from there with Connor scoring his 30th of the season into an empty net in the final minute.
Hellebuyck turned aside 27 shots for his 32nd victory of the season, and thanks to Washington’s overtime loss in Ottawa, Winnipeg now has the most points in the NHL with 75 points in 53 games.
Fittingly, the Jets will meet the Capitals Saturday evening in D.C. Puck drop is just after 6 p.m. with pregame coverage on 680 CJOB starting at 4 p.m.
