Blue Jackets take a bite out of Coyotes and remain undefeated at home
By Dave Seaman, Columbus Wired


The Columbus Blue Jackets have found its second scoring line. All three members of the Jackets’ third line—Jason Chimera, Manny Malhotra and Jared Boll—scored a goal as Columbus beat Phoenix 3-0 at Nationwide Arena Wednesday night.

Chimera and defenseman Jan Hejda each had two assists for Columbus, now 2-1 on the young season. For Hejda, it’s his first two points as a Blue Jacket and second career two-point game.

Pascal Leclaire picked up his second consecutive shutout, stopping all 32 shots he faced.

“As I always say, ‘the goalie gets the shutout, but really it’s a team thing,’” Leclaire said. “Our turnovers are down this year and I think we’re a lot better on the blue line. That’s how you win.”

Leclaire has not allowed a goal in just over 150 minutes and it’s the first time in franchise history that the team has opened the season with back-to-back shutouts at home.

Boll, who played his way onto the team during training camp, scored his first career goal. The Jackets fourth pick in the 2005 draft, had 28 goals for Plymouth of the Ontario Hockey League last season.

“It’s awesome playing with Manny and Chimera—they help me so much,” Boll said. “They tell me what I do right and what I do wrong position-wise. I think I play really well with them and it’s not hard to play with players like that.”

Chimera and Malhotra are no strangers to each other. They played on the third line most of last season, so they have great chemistry. Jackets coach Ken Hitchcock inserted Boll onto the right wing of the line during the preseason and the three have clicked ever since.

“Boll is a hard worker,” Chimera said. “He prides himself on hard work and me and Manny are the same kind of guys. We think the same game—everyone chips in equally.”

Malhotra said that he and Chimera were joking in the morning skate about being back together for the first time this season. “It just feels right, it feels natural,” he added. “Once you have an opportunity to play with somebody for a long time, you learn their tendencies. I know what to expect from him and he knows what to expect from me.”

Hitchcock got exactly what he wanted in the first period. The team came out with intensity and played the chippy, physical style that he preaches.

Malhotra took a centering pass from Chimera and hit a wrist shot over Coyote goalie David Aebischer at 10:45 of the first to put the team up 1-0.

“The first period was excellent,” Hitchcock said. “We were a little unlucky to be up only 1-0. We took the foot off the accelerator (in the second) and they came hard at us like we knew they would and then I thought we did a lot of good things in the third period.”

Columbus went up 2-0 early in the second period on a fluky goal. Hejda took a slap shot from the left dot which deflected off Aebischer’s skate. The puck then bounced off the leg pad of Chimera back into the net. After video review to see if he intentionally kicked it in, Chimera’s first goal of the season stood.

“One of the best goals of my life,” Chimera joked. “”Further in life, I’ll say it was an end-to-ender.”

Boll scored his first career goal at 6:25 of the third when he led a break-a-way and went top shelf on Aebischer. Chimera and Malhotra assisted on the goal.

“I saw (Aebischer) drop, so I knew I had to get it up,” Boll said.

The Jackets stellar penalty kill continued to be impressive, not allowing a Coyote power play goal on six attempts. On the season, the Jackets have not allowed a power play goal on 17 attempts.

That was one of the focuses of Hitchcock during the preseason and it’s a big reason why the team is playing competitive hockey early in the season.

“The goaltender was the best penalty killer today,” Hitchcock said. “We did a lot of good things, but then we started to leave our feed and run around a little bit in the third period. We needed Pascal big time, because they have four guys back there that can fire rockets and they were just loading up from back there.”

Columbus outshot Phoenix 33-32. Aebischer, who coming into the game as 7-0-0 against Columbus, had 30 saves.

The game also saw the season debut of Michael Peca, who played on the fourth line with Dan Fritsche and Gilbert Brule. He logged just under 13 minutes of time on 18 shifts.

The Jackets play in Colorado Saturday and return home to Nationwide Arena on Wednesday when Dallas visits.