Less than 30 minutes after being knocked out of the playoffs, David Gustafsson entered a multi-purpose room located in the bowels of Canada Life Centre to field questions from reporters. 

Before he even sat down or opened his mouth, his demeanor itself was worth 1,000 words. His facial expression encapsulated it all. The devastation. The frustration. The gut-wrenching feeling that understandably permeates throughout the locker room of a Manitoba Moose team that seemed destined to play more than just one round of playoff hockey.

The Moose entered Sunday’s matinee with all the momentum, having won Game Three and Game Four after losing the first two games of the best-of-five series. But, they came up short in Game Five, losing 2-1. And with that, the Winnipeg Jets’ AHL affiliate’s Calder Cup ambitions dissolved in the blink of an eye. 

“How do you describe it, I mean…” a teary-eyed Gustafsson said, his voice trailing off, before pausing for several seconds to capture his thoughts. “It’s a disappointment, I would say. I mean, I feel like we had such a good thing going.”

It wasn’t supposed to end this way.

Heading into Game Five, it really did feel like the stars aligned for Manitoba. Sure, the series may have gone right down to the wire, but you could argue Manitoba was the better team for most of the first four games. Even in the first games that they lost, they were downright dominant at even-strength. They controlled the pace of play.

“You look back and you’re like, we were just one shot away to end the series in four games instead of going for a fifth game,” Moose captain Jimmy Oligny said post-game.  

When the Moose returned to Winnipeg needing to win three straight to keep their season alive, their objectives were clear. Manitoba needed to get more of their chances on the net, create more net-front traffic, and improve their power play (which went 0/6). And they did. In Games Three and Four, the Moose registered a shot on goal on 66% of their even-strength slot chances (up from 57%) and they went 3/8 on the power play. They appeared to be regaining their mojo. 

“In [the] last two games, I felt like we like found our real game (and) played a [type of] game that would potentially be able to win a championship,” Gustafsson said. “And then we kind of just [threw] it all away today.”

Manitoba got off to a rough start in Game Five and they never really recovered.

The first period, after which Milwaukee finished with a 1-0 lead and a 13-4 shot edge, was arguably the Moose’s worst of the series. They couldn’t hit the net to save their life, and when they did, it was almost entirely from outside of high danger areas. Just one of their four shots in the first 20 minutes came from the slot.

But Manitoba’s shooting wasn’t the only issue.

“It’s hard to explain the first period,” Mark Morrison said. “To me, we looked like we were just slow to pucks all over the ice. They were winning the races [against] us.” 

Milwaukee out-muscled Manitoba, by a mile, in the first frame.

Then, 1:30 into the next period, the Admirals scored a power play goal to give themselves a two-goal cushion. Less than three minutes later, Morgan Barron opened the scoring for Manitoba, making it a one-goal game that would remain from there on out. Between Barron’s goal and the end of the game, Manitoba outshot the Admirals 20-6. But that advantage was just smoke and mirrors. In reality, they were producing virtually zero high-danger shots.

Ultimately, Milwaukee managed to virtually shut down Manitoba’s home plate shot production. That forced the Moose to take a lot of their shots from outside the slot, which made life easy for Admirals goaltender Connor Ingram. It was like Game One and Game Two all over again, really.

“Maybe [becuase] the playoff experience wasn’t there,” Morrison wondered out loud when discussing his team’s effort in what was a third straight do-or-die game. “They just weren’t as good as they’ve been, [I’ll] put it that way.”

A Special Group

All season long, the Moose had their sights were set on hoisting the Calder Cup.

“That’s why it’s so hard to deal with right now,” Oligny said.

It wasn’t a reach to think Manitoba could contend for the Calder. Besides, they had been one of the most dominant teams at even-strength all year. Even when their roster was turned upside down, the Moose’s collective output in the standings never really wavered. Chemistry can often be disregarded and tossed to the side as if it’s some sort of buzzword, but it was the lynchpin of Manitoba’s continuous success this season.

The Moose were a tight-knit group that took pride in inclusive culture while adopting hard work as its identity — a rarity. 

“It’s hard to put together a group that was that tight, [got along], and wanted to win,” Morrison said.

Everyone had bought in. 

“There wasn’t one single guy that was relying on only skills,” Oligny said about the work ethic within his dressing room. “Everybody was working, from [the] first line to the fourth and all three pairings.”

It drove their success. It’s what helped them go 7-2-1-0 from mid-January to early February despite COVID-19 cases, call-ups, and injuries decimating the Moose roster. Manitoba’s pride in the grind is what helped them claw back in the series — and made a heck of a lot of people believers in this team.

Player Performances

Data via InStat (attribution for all the data used). 

Hear Jacob recap the Manitoba-Milwaukee series on The Calder Farmstead AHL Podcast.