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Jets furious over Minnesota’s controversial overtime winner

The Winnipeg Jets are in a bit of a slump right now.

Their 3-2 overtime loss to the Minnesota Wild on Saturday was their eighth in the past 10 games, and saw them give up a crucial point to a team they are competing with for a playoff spot. Making things even more frustrating on Saturday is how they felt Eric Staal’s winning goal shouldn’t have counted due to goaltender interference.

Here’s what happened: During a scramble in front of the net, Minnesota’s Zach Parise made contact with Jets goaltender Connor Hellebuyck just before Staal scored his 16th goal of the season. The play was reviewed by the situation room in Toronto, and it was determined that Jets players Anthony Bitetto and Tucker Poolman caused Parise to make the contact, thus allowing the goal to count.

You can see the play the video above.

There is definitely some contact between Bitetto and Poolman, but was it enough to force Parise into the goalie? Did Parise do enough to avoid making contact? Those are important questions, and given the way he stretches his arms and stick out and hits Hellebuyck it is not hard to see why the Jets are so mad about the call.

After the game Jets coach Paul Maurice said (Via the Winnipeg Sun) “It’s goalie interference all day long for me and there’s not a lot of grey area on that one.”

From there, he refused to offer any more comment on the play because anything else was going to get “expensive” for him.

The Jets exceeded expectations for much of the first half given the state of their defense. The play of Hellebuyck was one of the big driving factors in that early success. They are still holding the second Wild Card spot in the Western Conference, but they are very much on the postseason bubble.

Adam Gretz is a writer for Pro Hockey Talk on NBC Sports. Drop him a line at phtblog@nbcsports.com or follow him on Twitter @AGretz.