Let’s close out this week in style… albeit, a different style.
Our resident NHL DFS expert, Tom, has been sidelined with the flu – reports suggest that it is not contagious through the internet – and, in his absence, I will be filling in for Friday’s column. Rest assured, I know what I’m doing.
In addition to getting some quick insight from Tom for at least one team he would specifically like to target – more on this, later – I will be using the over/under point totals and moneylines to help drive my decisions. If you’ve read my work from the NFL season, you know this is my preferred method-of-attack, both for picking games correctly and developing a daily fantasy lineup. Let’s get started.
With only four games on the schedule, I’ll go ahead and list the odds for each pairing, even if neither side of a particular game excites me:
Edmonton Oilers @ Washington Capitals (Washington, -205, 5 over/under)
Calgary Flames @ Florida Panthers (Florida, -148, 5.5 over/under)
Ottawa Senators @ Carolina Hurricanes (Carolina, -137, 5 over/under)
Arizona Coyotes @ Dallas Stars (Dallas, -235, 6 over/under)
Edmonton Oilers @ Washington Capitals
Immediately, we have a buying opportunity in the first game of the night. Washington – leading the National Hockey League in both wins and points – is fairly heavy favorites against Edmonton – at the time of this writing, -205. But, Washington is carrying a large moneyline against a good Edmonton team – one with a top-notch talent in Connor McDavid and an offense that has scored the third-most goals in the Western Conference. The real eye-opener? The over/under point total opened at an extremely tantalizing five points.
For a game that features Alexander Ovechkin and his team’s powerful offense against McDavid and his crew, this number appears to be far too low. But, so does Edmonton’s odds for winning the game. The combination gives us a great tournament play – the Oilers’ starting goaltender, Cam Talbot ($8.8K). Using Talbot – of course, assuming he is the confirmed starter for Friday night – against Washington is certainly risky, but we need to hit on a big reward in order to move up the standings in a tournament. For a cash game, Washington’s Braden Holtby ($9.3K) is the ‘safer’ pick. Either way, the over/under ‘trap’ and lopsided odds point towards a tightly-contested, lower-scoring game.
Calgary Flames @ Florida Panthers