Jeff Jakaitis (born June 9, 1983) is a former

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

professional

ice hockey Ice hockey (or simply hockey) is a team sport played on ice skates, usually on an ice skating rink with lines and markings specific to the sport. It belongs to a family of sports called hockey. In ice hockey, two opposing teams use ice h ...

goaltender In ice hockey, the goaltender (commonly referred to as the goalie) is the player responsible for preventing the hockey puck from entering their team's net, thus preventing the opposing team from scoring. The goaltender mostly plays in or near t ...

who last played for the

South Carolina Stingrays The South Carolina Stingrays are a professional minor league ice hockey team based in North Charleston, South Carolina. The Stingrays play in the South Division of the ECHL's Eastern Conference. They play their home games at the North Charleston Co ...

of the

ECHL The ECHL (formerly the East Coast Hockey League) is a mid-level professional ice hockey league based in Shrewsbury, New Jersey, with teams scattered across the United States and Canada. It is a tier below the American Hockey League (AHL). The ...

Playing career

College

Jakaitis played

college hockey College ice hockey is played principally in the United States and Canada, though leagues exist outside North America. In the United States, competitive "college hockey" refers to ice hockey played between colleges and universities within the g ...

for the

Lake Superior State Lakers The Lake Superior State Lakers (LSSU Lakers) are the athletic teams that represent the Lake Superior State University, located in Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, in NCAA Division II intercollegiate sporting competitions. The Lakers compete as members ...

in the CCHA (NCAA Division I). He was named to the All-CCHA First Team at the completion of the 2005–06 season and to the All-CCHA Second team at the completion of the 2006-07.

Professional

Jakaitis began his professional career in the 2007–08 season with the

Columbia Inferno The Columbia Inferno were an ECHL team based in Columbia, South Carolina. Beginning in 2008, the team went on voluntary suspension awaiting construction of a new arena in suburban Lexington County, South Carolina. However, the ECHL dropped Columb ...

of the ECHL. He played in 36 games in his first pro season posting a 2.92 GAA and .909

save percentage Save percentage (often known by such symbols as SV%, SVS%, SVP, PCT) is a statistic in various goal-scoring sports that track saves as a statistic. In ice hockey and lacrosse, it is a statistic that represents the percentage of shots on goal ...

. For the 2008–09 season Jakaitis signed with the

Charlotte Checkers The Charlotte Checkers are a minor-league professional ice hockey team based in Charlotte, North Carolina. They are members of the Atlantic Division of the Eastern Conference in the American Hockey League (AHL), and are the top minor league affi ...

and played 47 ECHL games that year along with 1

American Hockey League The American Hockey League (AHL) is a professional ice hockey league based in the United States and Canada that serves as the primary developmental league for the National Hockey League (NHL). Since the 2010–11 season, every team in the le ...

game for the Portland Pirates. Jakaitis relocated to

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

to play with

HC Pustertal Wölfe HC Pustertal Wölfe – Val Pusteria Wolves are an Italian professional ice hockey team from Bruneck, currently playing, as of the 2021–22 season, in the ICE Hockey League (ICEHL). They formerly played in the Alps Hockey League and Serie A. T ...

of the Elite.A (at the time called Serie A). While with the Italian club he played in 39 games. After one season in Italy Jakaitis returned to North America by signing with the

Dayton Gems The Dayton Gems were a minor league ice hockey team based in Dayton, Ohio, and members of the International Hockey League from 1964 to 1977, and 1979–1980. In the fall of 1964, the lobby of their new arena, Hara Arena, had a natural gas ex ...

of the

Central Hockey League The Central Hockey League (CHL) was a North American mid-level minor professional ice hockey league which operated from 1992 until 2014. It was founded by Ray Miron and Bill Levins and later sold to Global Entertainment Corporation, which opera ...

for the 2010–11 season playing 42 games with that club and played in the

2011 Central Hockey League All-Star Game The 2011 Central Hockey League All-Star Game was on January 12, 2011 at the Rushmore Plaza Civic Center in Rapid City, South Dakota, home of the Rapid City Rush, in the 2010–11 CHL season. The game was held between the defending champions Rapid ...

. During this season he earned tryouts with the

Worcester Sharks The Worcester Sharks were a professional ice hockey team in the American Hockey League (AHL) that played from 2006 to 2015. Affiliated with the National Hockey League's San Jose Sharks and located in Worcester, Massachusetts, the Sharks played t ...

and the Portland Pirates but was unsuccessful on both occasions. For the 2011-12 season he signed with the

Rochester Americans The Rochester Americans (colloquially known as the Amerks) are a professional ice hockey team in the American Hockey League; the team is an owned and operated affiliate of the Buffalo Sabres. The team plays its home games in Rochester, New York, ...

but did not play for them during that season as he was reassigned to play with the

Gwinnett Gladiators The Atlanta Gladiators are a professional minor league ice hockey team based in Duluth, Georgia. The Gladiators play in the South Division of the ECHL's Eastern Conference. They play their home games at Gas South Arena, approximately northeast o ...

of the ECHL, he played in 26 ECHL games and won the ECHL Goaltender of the Year award for his play. In 2012-13 Jakaitis started out without a team, but was signed briefly by the Gladiators as an emergency backup before being signed by the

on December 11, 2012. He was signed to a professional tryout contract by the Houston Aeros of the AHL but was returned to the Stingrays the next day without playing a game for the team. On September 13, 2013 the Stingrays resigned Jakaitis. From March 7 through March 20, 2015, Jakaitis set the longest shutout streak in the ECHL and minor league hockey with a time of 321 minutes, 46 seconds, just short of the all-time professional hockey record set by

Brian Boucher Brian Boucher ( ; born January 2, 1977) is an American former professional ice hockey goaltender who is a game and studio analyst on national ESPN and ABC games and also Philadelphia Flyers games on NBC Sports Philadelphia. He played 13 season ...

's 332 minutes, 1 second during the 2003-04 NHL season while backstopping the Phoenix Coyotes. During this time the Stingrays would also set a league record with 23 straight wins. Jakaitis would be named the ECHL's Most Valuable Player at the end of the 2014–15 regular season. On August 17, 2015, Jakaitis left the Stingrays after three seasons and made a second venture to Europe, signing a one-year contract with Norwegian club, Lørenskog IK of the GET-ligaen.

Return to the Stingrays and retirement

On October 17, 2017, it was officially announced that Jakaitis would be re-joining the South Carolina Stingrays as their starting goaltender. Jakaitis started in goal on the Stingrays season opener on October 20, 2017, and obtained his first win of the season, beating out the Greenville Swamp Rabbits with a score of 4-3. Following the 2017–18 ECHL season, Jakaitis retired from professional hockey, although he would make one more appearance in February 2019 for the Stingrays.

Awards and honors

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Jakaitis, Jeff 1983 births Living people American men's ice hockey goaltenders Charlotte Checkers (1993–2010) players Columbia Inferno players Dayton Gems players Gwinnett Gladiators players Hartford Wolf Pack players HC Pustertal Wölfe players Ice hockey players from Minnesota Lake Superior State Lakers men's ice hockey players Lørenskog IK players Sportspeople from Rochester, Minnesota Portland Pirates players Providence Bruins players South Carolina Stingrays players Waterloo Black Hawks players Worcester Sharks players