Wheeler scores 2 goals to lift the Jets over the Hurricanes 3-1

RALEIGH, N.C. – Blake Wheeler wasn’t going to let the Winnipeg Jets lose two straight. So he scored twice and got an assist in their 3-1 win over the Carolina Hurricanes on Thursday night.

The Jets rebounded from a shutout loss in their last outing and raised their record to 7-1-2 in their last 10 games.

Wheeler said good teams don’t lose two in a row often.

“We like the way we’ve been playing recently and we didn’t want to get away from that because of one loss,” Wheeler said. “We’re a confident group right now. You never want to lose two games in a row. That’s a staple of good teams, teams that are playoff-calibre teams. We didn’t want to let this slide.”

After winning four straight, Carolina has lost two of the last three games.

Hurricanes coach Bill Peters said his team didn’t match Winnipeg’s intensity.

“I didn’t like our start again,” Peters said. “Usually we have more energy that we had tonight and for whatever reason we didn’t have a lot of energy and never really got going.”

The Jets outshot Carolina 8-1 to start the game. Winnipeg finished with a 13-6 shot advantage in the period and outshot Carolina 37-23 in the game.

Wheeler gave the Jets a 1-0 lead at 5:29 of the first period to get his team going.

“We just tried to get a couple of pucks going to the net and it was great to see a few finally hit the net,” Wheeler said.

Elias Lindholm, who has points in six of the last seven games for the Hurricanes, scored on the power play to tie the game 1-1 at 3:44 of the second period.

But it didn’t last as Wheeler scored on a tip-in at the front of the net to put the Jets back in the lead 2-1 at 13:02. It was his team-leading seventh goal of the season.

Michael Frolik put the game out of reach with an empty-net goal for Winnipeg with 1:30 left in the game.

Hurricanes goalkeeper Cam Ward, who finished with a season-high 34 saves, had his five-game winning streak snapped.

Winnipeg backup goalkeeper Michael Hutchinson (2-1-0) saw his first action in 11 days and earned the win with 22 saves.

“Defensively, the guys did a good job of letting me see pucks,” Hutchinson said. “All in all, it was a pretty easy night. I’ve been fortunate that my last two starts, we’ve had really good starts with some early goals. That always makes the game that much easier.”

The Hurricanes were 1-for-3 on the power play, while Winnipeg went 0-for-2 with the man-advantage.

NOTES: Winnipeg RW Blake Wheeler had his second multi-goal game of the season. His first came in the season opener on Oct. 9 at Arizona. … The Hurricanes have recorded power-play goals in six of their last seven games, including the last four straight.