The Columbus Blue Jackets, you might remember, came dangerously close to making the NHL playoffs this season, winning their final six games while the Canadiens were stumbling their way to the finish line. 

The wonderfully named Jet Greaves is a big reason why there were some anxious moments in Montreal. Now, the 24-year-old goaltender is doing his best to make life miserable for the Laval Rocket.

Greaves, now playing for Cleveland — the Blue Jackets’ AHL affiliate — was magnificent Sunday afternoon, leading the Monsters to a 3-1 victory over the Rocket at Place Bell before a capacity crowd of 10,243. 

Greaves stopped 36 shots, including 18 in the third period, as Cleveland staved off elimination in the best-of-five series, narrowing its deficit to 2-1 heading into Tuesday night’s fourth game at Laval. 

The Rocket won the opening two games of this series, both on the road last week, beating Greaves seven times over 120 minutes. But it was a different story on Sunday while facing a team desperate to continue its season. 

Dylan Gambrell scored twice for Cleveland. Roman Ahcan scored a shorthanded goal in the third period — providing the visitors with a 3-0 lead — while adding two assists. Laurent Dauphin, who produced a team-leading 26 goals this season, scored the Rocket’s lone goal with fewer than seven minutes remaining in regulation time. 

“He (Greaves) is a good goalie,” said Dauphin, who had a team-high seven shots. “We have to give him credit, but maybe we need more guys in front and try to play with his vision.” 

Greaves went undrafted before signing with Columbus as a free agent in February 2022. He went 7-2-2 with the Blue Jackets this season with a 1.91 goals-against average, .938 save percentage and two shutouts. Although only a modest 6-feet and 190 pounds, he won five consecutive games for Columbus between April 10-17 as the team attempted in vain to secure the final wild-card berth in the Eastern Conference, falling just short.

Named after martial artist and actor Jet Li, Greaves goes by Calvin when he’s at his parents’ Cambridge, Ont., home; Jet actually is his middle name. 

He has 21 NHL games on his resumé — including 20 starts — over three seasons and has gone 10-9-2 with a 2.62 average and .924 save percentage. That includes nine games last season when the Blue Jackets were coached by Pascal Vincent, who landed in Laval after being fired by Columbus. 

While there was no disputing Greaves’s prowess on this day, the Rocket did itself no favours, squandering four power plays while also allowing the short-handed goal. 

“That doesn’t help to win hockey games,” Vincent acknowledged. “Our power play has to be better. We have to be more dynamic. We have to move the puck. We have to be in motion. We have to take away the goalie’s eyes. There’s lot of things we can do better. There’s a few things we know we need to do. It’s doable. It’s fixable right away. That’s one part, but we need to be better.” 

While coaches rarely will tinker with a winning lineup, Vincent did precisely that, starting Cayden Primeau in goal — after Jacob Fowler produced a shutout in Friday’s second game — while inserting Oliver Kapanen at centre between Joshua Roy and Owen Beck. Both players were with the Canadiens during their opening-round loss to Washington before being loaned on Saturday to the Rocket. 

“We have good players,” Vincent said. “We couldn’t use Primeau before. We knew if he was coming back he was playing a game. Kapanen played in the playoffs with Montreal. As soon as he was available he was playing for us. He’s a good player. They were really hard decisions but, for the goalies, it was planned a long time ahead.” 

Primeau couldn’t be faulted for any of Cleveland’s goals, while Kapanen played a strong game, directing five shots at Greaves. Primeau, who backed up Jakub Dobes after Samuel Montembeault was injured in the third game against the Capitals, was playing for the first time since April 18, against Belleville. Primeau said he learned he was starting well in advance. 

“It was a weird scenario, weird situation,” he said. “You want to play as many games in the playoffs. I felt good, but I didn’t really love my rebound control. I felt good after a couple minutes.”

While the Rocket had an abundance of scoring opportunities, the team started sluggishly and didn’t have great pace to its game before finding its groove well into the first period. Laval, which finished first overall this season in the AHL, will undoubtedly want to pounce on the Monsters more quickly on Tuesday and avoid having its season come down to a deciding fifth game, also at home, this Friday. 

“We’ve just got to shoot more and it’s going to go in sometime,” said Joshua Roy, who had four shots himself. “I think we need to bring more traffic to the net.” 

The Rocket are learning what many teams already know: The last win in a series is usually the hardest to get.