Dropping Game 1 in ugly fashion in their best-of-five series with the Calgary Flames, while losing Mark Scheifele, Patrik Laine and Mason Appleton in the process, forced the Jets into an uphill battle entering Game 2 Monday afternoon.

But as they’ve done all season long, the Jets battled through adversity, tying the series up at one with a 3-2 victory.

“We’re comfortable facing this adversity, and pretty much throughout the year we’ve had key guys out of the lineup and at different times there have been a handful of guys. I think that’s a testament to our team’s depth. Guys coming in and taking advantage of their opportunity,” said Adam Lowry who scored the second of three Jets goals Monday.

One of those guys that got an opportunity thanks to three regulars being out of the lineup was Jansen Harkins.

It was also Harkins who opened the scoring for the Jets with his first career playoff goal in his first career playoff game.

“You look at Harks coming in, he scores a big goal for us, that gets us going early in the first,” added Lowry. “I think you saw it tonight, we were a little harder on pucks, we were a lot quicker to the battles. That’s the difference.”

When a young player like Harkins is forced into the lineup as an injury replacement, it’s never an ideal situation. But when a young player can come in and make an immediate impact like Harkins did Monday, the mood on the bench quickly can change.

“You need guys to step up and it’s not a great situation when you’re filling in for Mark Scheifele and Patrik Laine,” said Blake Wheeler

“Harks is a guy that brings a lot of speed to our lineup. He’s demonstrated the ability to make some plays with the puck on his stick. It was a huge goal for a young kid to gain some confidence in this situation and obviously for our team to get a boost and kind of pick ourselves off the floor from the last game.”

The game was Harkins first since March 6th, but his effort in this one would have told you something different. Although he only had one shot on goal in 9:29 of ice time, Harkins made sure that one shot was an impactful one.

“It’s not easy to not play a game for a long time and come in and do what he did and do what he does. He’s a guy who works his ass off each and every practice and when you watch practice you can see it,” said forward Nikolaj Ehlers. “It’s fun to have guys like that come in, make a big difference and you know it’s coming again tomorrow.”

Speaking of Ehlers, the 24-year old had a first of his own as his third period power play strike served as the game-winner. In his 23rd career playoff game, it was his first playoff goal.

"Did you say it's been years? It felt great,” a relieved Ehlers said.

“I keep saying the same thing and I’m going to say it again, you want to score goals, you want to be a difference maker and when you’re not able to score goals, you got to help the team in other ways. I think I’ve tried to do that as good as I could and not think about it too much that it’s been a while since I scored a goal. Of course it felt nice to finally get it and hopefully they keep coming.”

Ehlers’ goal not only came at the perfect time in the game from a score stand point, but it also followed an ugly turnover that led to the Flames first goal of the game, one that swayed momentum in Calgary’s favor.

The Flames eventually tied the game exactly six minutes later.

Shortly before his goal, Ehlers avoided a costly mistake as the Flames were unable to take advantage of Ehlers unsportsmanlike conduct penalty for losing his cool with Matthew Tkachuk.

“All part of Nicky’s journey. He’s here to make plays, be a game breaker in a lot of ways and it hasn’t happened yet for him in the playoffs,” said head coach Paul Maurice. “The giveaway you’re frustrated with, the penalty I can understand. Just so I’m clear on this, not the call, the event.”

Ehlers’ power play strike came as he worked his way into the dirty area and had his stick in the right place at the right time, tipping a Neal Pionk point shot past Flames’ goalie Cam Talbot.

“That’s not usually my spot on the power play,” said Ehlers. “I was in there, I know what I need to do in there and I was lucky enough to get a stick on the puck. It felt great, but like you said you learn every single game whether it’s preseason, regular season or playoffs. Got to get in where it hurts a little and I was able to do that today.”

As much as Ehlers was relieved to finally add a playoff goal to his resume, it seemed like his head coach was more relieved than Ehlers.

"Man, he needed that. You need to feel apart, you need to feel you’re apart of the cause and he has been, he’s played some good hockey for us,” said Maurice. “Better that than a goal in a 4-1 loss. If you’re going to get one, he needs the game winner in a game that we’re up against it. He gets to carry that with him.”

Ehlers won’t have to wait long to try for playoff goal number two as the two teams are right back at Tuesday afternoon.

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