More heartbreak for Jets, fans in overtime defeat

Rakell nets winner for Ducks, who lead series 3-0

WINNIPEG (CP) — Fired up for the first NHL playoff game in town in 19 years, Winnipeg Jets fans booed Corey Perry off the ice in warm-ups and cheered every icing call against the Anaheim Ducks. They went silent when the Ducks scored.

The waves of emotion ebbed and flowed throughout 60 minutes of hockey. The raucous “whiteout crowd” left on a down note after Anaheim’s Rickard Rakell scored in overtime to beat the Jets 5-4 Monday night at MTS Centre and take a stranglehold with a 3-0 series lead.

For the third straight game, Winnipeg blew a third-period lead and in the process became the first team in NHL history to lose the first three of a series when leading at the second intermission each time, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.

“More of the same,” said Jets forward Blake Wheeler. “We lead the whole damn series and we’re down 0-3.”

Winnipeg now faces elimination in Game 4 on Wednesday night.

“We’ve got a mountain to climb and we’re looking forward to the challenge,” said Jets forward Bryan Little.

Noise levels were off the charts for a crowd that had waited since 1996 for a Stanley Cup playoff game. With fans across the continent watching in amazement and envy, it was exactly the kind of atmosphere everyone anticipated given the drought, and then some.

“That’s as good a building as I’ve ever seen in my life,” said Winnipeg coach Paul Maurice. “We had good jump and good legs because of it.”

The arena went quiet when Cam Fowler scored to tie it late in the first and on goals by Perry, Jakob Silfverberg and then Ryan Kesler’s that tied it again in the waning minutes of regulation. Fans chanted “Go Jets Go” when Rakell ended it. Frederik Andersen stopped 31 shots in net for the Ducks.

On the other side, the place just about shook when the Jets scored: Lee Stempniak’s goal to open things, Tyler Myers’s power-play goal, and Wheeler’s and Little’s each of which gave Winnipeg the lead. Saves by Ondrej Pavelec — 26 in total — drew chants of “Pavy, Pavy” throughout the night, but it wasn’t enough.

Pavelec couldn’t do anything to stop Kesler’s one-timer at the 17:46 mark.

The waves of noise started during warm-ups. Messages like “The wait is finally over” and “The storm is coming” flashed on the video screens before the game started and helped rile fans up into a frenzy.

“We certainly fed off the energy,” Stempniak said. “It was a special night for us in terms of the fans and their energy.”