ANALYSIS: No guarantees as Winnipeg Jets’ playoff run set to begin

Depending on whom you might ask, Tuesday night’s win over Seattle wasn’t supposed to be that difficult for the Winnipeg Jets.

In the most utopian of scenarios, Winnipeg was presumed to take the ice, win a game, and secure second place in the Central Division.

Oh sure, the Jets won and did earn home ice in the first round of the playoffs against Colorado next week, but they surrendered a two-goal lead in the second and needed a power-play marker in the final eight minutes to eventually tilt the compelling contest in their favour.

After all, leading up to game time, it was a mere tap-in based on the Jets’ six-game winning streak, the Kraken losing three in a row, and with Winnipeg destined for the playoffs with over 100 points and Seattle going to miss them by 17.

In the end, the Jets produced the point they required and will now have the advantage against the Avalanche with home ice, last change in the majority of games, and invariably travel one less time in the series if it goes the distance.

Those, of course, are all important assets and aspects when you’re looking for an upper hand in the Stanley Cup playoffs, and ones the Jets earned by producing seven straight wins down the stretch.

But there is no guarantee of anything when the puck drops Sunday or Monday and what Winnipeg captured Tuesday is really the only opportunity to play before two sellouts at Canada Life Centre to begin the series, and nothing more.

Beyond that, what’s expected to be a captivating postseason go-around between the Jets and the Avs for the first time in history is guaranteed to open in Winnipeg now, based on Tuesday’s result — and it could play out just as unpredictably, depending on who you might ask.

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