Jets Receive Tough Mark Scheifele Injury Update Ahead of Crucial Game 6 vs Blues

The Winnipeg Jets won’t have one of their top guys in the lineup when they look to close out the St. Louis Blues on the road on Friday.

Head coach Scott Arneil said on Thursday that Mark Scheifele, who left after the first period of Game 5 following big hits from Brayden Schenn and Radek Faksa, won’t travel with the team here.

Via Elliotte Friedman:

There was a lot of controversy around the Scheifele injury. Arneil and Blues boss Jim Montgomery exchanged blows postgame on Wednesday after Arneil took issue with the Schenn hit, which didn’t even warrant a penalty. However, Montgomery insisted the incident happened on the Faksa hit.

That set the Jets HC off:

“I didn’t know Monty got his medical degree, trying to say how our player got hurt. He’s way off base,” said Arniel, via The athletic.

Scheifele is listed as day-to-day right now, and Arneil wouldn’t confirm if he is in concussion protocol. The veteran has done his part in this series as the Jets lead 3-2, scoring twice and tallying four helpers.

During the regular season, Scheifele was second on the team behind Kyle Connor with 87 points, including 39 goals and 48 assists.

Connor made it clear that everyone on the roster must step up in the absence of Scheifele, and he expects Vladislav Namestnikov to be one of them:

“It’s not one guy that needs to fill the shoes of Mark,” Connor said. “It needs to be everybody. And the way [Namestnikov] plays, he’s been great for the whole series and a couple chances here or there he could have some better results. You see it tonight. He drives hard to the net, plays all hard areas very well, defends well and obviously a key contributor on two of those goals.”

The Jets and Blues will face off at 8 PM EDT on Friday at the Enterprise Center.