Welcome to the daily fantasy hockey top stacks for Jan. 25. After tonight’s slate we go on a DFS break as the NHL heads into their All-Star break. We have a nice 15 game slate to work with for our DFS needs tonight and I’ll go through a few teams I think offer us the best chance to build solid rosters for cash and tournament games.
Even though Brad Marchand was suspended for five games on Wednesday I still want to go heavy with Boston tonight. It’s a tough loss for Boston as Marchand leads the Bruins in goals and assists — but his absence could open up a value play for us on that top line with Patrice Bergeron and David Pastrnak. And here’s the reason why I still want to lean on Boston: the Boston Bruins draw the Ottawa Senators tonight.
On the season Ottawa has allowed a league second-worst 3.43 goals against per game, have the fifth-worst penalty kill in the NHL with kill rate of just 75.2 percent, and are currently mired in a four game losing streak where they have allowed 15 goals and have scored just five. Over their past 10 games Ottawa has a CF% of 45.05 — second-worst in the league. Additionally, they have a league fourth-worst SCA/60 of 31.78 over their past 10 games and a league eighth-worst 11.47 HDCA/60 over their past 10 games. In January the Senators have allowed a league second-worst nine power play goals against and a league third-worst 3.89 goals against per game.
Even though the following numbers are with Marchand in the lineup it certainly gives us every reason to stack up Boston tonight. Boston has been the offensive team in hockey this month with an average of 4.22 goals per game, have the sixth-best CF% in the NHL over their past 10 games at 52.28 percent and have the highest GF/60 in the NHL over their past 10 games at 3.61.
So, Boston will be without Marchand but we still have a Bergeron/Pastrnak stack to work with. This duo has a sample size of 115:22 minutes together without Marchand and the numbers are still very good. In that time together they have a GF/60 of 3.12, a CF% of 55.90 percent, a SCF/60 of 33.81 and an offensive zone faceoff percentage of 72.13 percent.
As of 11:00 this morning there wasn’t a lot of clarity on who may skate with that top line tonight but one Boston writer I spoke with last night believed Jake DeBrusk could step into that first line role. DeBrusk is $4.3K on FanDuel and skates on Boston’s top power play unit — if he does indeed jump to that top line he makes for perhaps the best value play of the night.
But Fluto Shinzawa of the Boston Globe just tweeted:
Anders Bjork is skating in Brad Marchand’s spot on the first line. Has played mostly RW.
— Fluto Shinzawa (@GlobeFluto) January 25, 2018
So it is likely that Bjork gets that spot with Bergeron and Pastrnak. Bjork is just $3.4K on FanDuel. Keep tabs on this as the day goes on.
As a game stack we have to stack up both sides of the Vegas Golden Knights vs. New York Islanders. This game was tagged with a whopping over/under of seven with Vegas as the healthy home favorite (it dropped to 6.5 Thursday morning). The top two lines for both teams are certainly in play but we’ll start with Vegas as the Islanders have allowed a league-worst 4.00 goals per game in January.
A top stack tonight is Vegas line one stack of REILLY SMITH/WILLIAM KARLSSON/JONATHAN MARCHESSAULT. Per LeftWingLock this line has been the most productive line in the NHL in 5v5 situations over the past 10 games with 11 goals for and 125 shot attempts for. Of note: Smith has not recorded a point in five straight games — so you could go with a power play stack of Karlsson/Marchessault/Theodore to get the most bang for your Vegas buck.
Vegas has been on roll their past two games with 11 goals scored and four power play goals. I want to ride the Vegas wave tonight in both tournaments and cash games.
Recent key stats of Vegas skaters:
Jon Marchessault: has 1 goals, 4 assists and 20 shots on goal over his past 5 games
William Karlsson: has 4 goals and 1 assist over his past 5 games.
David Perron: has 2 goals and 5 assists over his past 5 games.
Shea Theodore: has 4 assists over his past 5 games.
James Neal: has 4 goals and 1 assist over his past 5 games.
Erik Haula: has 1 goal and 5 assists over his past 5 games.
One stack I will look to, especially in tournaments is the
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