The Winnipeg Jets are in the playoffs. (USATSI)
The Winnipeg Jets are in the playoffs. (USATSI)

It's official. For the first time since 1996 the city of Winnipeg is going to experience an NHL playoff game. That means what was already one of the NHL's toughest and loudest arenas is probably getting ready to crank the noise up to 11. 

Even though the Jets lost to the Colorado Avalanche on Thursday night, they still managed to clinch a playoff spot thanks to the Calgary Flames' win over the Los Angeles Kings and set the entire Western Conference playoff field. 

For the current Jets organization, which started out as the Atlanta Thrashers, it is only the second postseason appearance in its 15 year existence and the first since moving to Winnipeg for the 2011-12 season. The current organization is still searching for its first ever playoff win, having been swept in the first round by the New York Rangers during the 2006-07 season. 

But for hockey fans in Winnipeg, the wait has been significantly longer. And now, finally, after nearly two decades, the waiting is over. That also means the return of one of the NHL's great playoff traditions: the Winnipeg whiteout.

The amazing thing about the Jets' season is that the core of the roster is largely the same as previous years (Blake Wheeler, Andrew Ladd, Dustin Byfuglien, Bryan Little, Ondrej Pavelec) when the team consistently fell short of the playoffs. There was so little turnover on the roster from its days in Atlanta that the team didn't even make a trade that involved a player currently on an NHL roster being swapped for another player on an NHL roster until this season when they sent Evander Kane to the Buffalo Sabres for Tyler Myers and Drew Stafford. Every other trade involving the Jets since moving to Winnipeg involved either prospects or draft picks. 

But thanks to a couple of shrewd moves that slipped under the radar, like picking up Mathieu Perrault in free agency, a handful of up-and-coming young players, and some improved goaltending (both from Pavelec and Michael Hutchinson), the Jets were able to overcome playing in what might be the toughest division in the league to capture one of the Western Conference's two wild card spots. 

With the Jets and Flames clinching playoff spots, it also means that four Canadian teams -- Montreal, Vancouver, Calgary and Winnipeg -- are in the postseason with the possibility still out there for a fifth team -- Ottawa -- to get in as well.