What changed between the Winnipeg Jets and Connor Hellebuyck, Mark Scheifele?

The Winnipeg Jets had the headlining news on Monday when they re-signed center Mark Scheifele and goaltender Connor Hellebuyck to matching seven-year deals with $8.5 million cap hits. It was a surprise to many, as for most of the offseason it seemed like the Jets were looking to move on from both players like they did with Pierre Luc-Dubois and Blake Wheeler.

Murat Ates of the Athletic joined Tyler Yaremchuk and Frank Seravalli on Daily Faceoff Live to talk about the signings, and how the situation surrounding it changed so quickly.

Murat Ates: It’s huge news. It’s massive news to extend Hellebuyck and Scheifele, seven years and each of those starts at the beginning of next season.

I got to tell you, when we started the offseason, there was a lot of question marks about what these guys’ futures would hold. There was a sense that Dubois was on his way out, Wheeler was on his way out. Well, what about those next two foundational pieces, Hellebuyck and Scheifele?

And I think at some point in the summer, something may have changed with respect to those players, because you had a public change of stance from the Jets, where Kevin Cheveldayoff was going from “we need to assess everything, we need assess everything” to “well hold on guys, if we lose those two players, it’s an awfully big hole from our team”. I wonder if that’s trade market related, I wonder if that’s just a response to finding out that they’re actually interested in re-signing.

And then by about summer’s end, and whether that was Mark Chipman, whether it was Cheveldayoff, the Jets verbal was we’re a win now team, these guys are very important. And that’s when the thought, the possibilities, and even a couple of rumours about extensions began to build. But even when I woke up yesterday, I don’t think that I thought it was as pending as it was, and that the news was just around the corner.

You can watch the full episode here…