NHL Betting News and Notes Tuesday, November 14, 2017

NHL Knowledge

Penguins won nine of last ten games with Buffalo; four of last six series games went over. Sabres were outscored 18-10 in losing their last four games here. Buffalo lost five of its last seven games overall, three of last four on road. Under is 4-1-1 in last six series games. Penguins lost six of last eight overall but won their last three home games. Under is 7-3 in their last ten games.

Columbus won four of its last five games with the Canadiens; they’re 2-3 in last five visits to Montreal (under 4-1). Blue Jackets lost four of last five games overall, three of last five on the road. Last three Columbus games stayed under. Montreal won four of last five games overall, four of last six home games. Canadiens’ last four games stayed under the total.

Road team won eight of last ten Dallas-Florida games; under is 3-2 in last five series games played here. Dallas Stars won their last three visits to south Florida. Dallas are 4-5 in last nine games overall, 2-4 in last six road games. Under is 4-2-1 in their last seven games. Florida lost six of last seven games; last three stayed under total. Panthers were outscored 23-14 in losing their last four home games.

Winnipeg won six of last eight games with Arizona; over is 4-2 in last six series games. Coyotes lost their last four visits to Manitoba. Arizona lost its last four games, is 2-17 for season; their last five games stayed under the total. Coyotes were outscored 14-8 in losing their last four road games. Jets won five of their last seven games, three of their last four at home (over 4-0).

Nashville won five of last seven games with Washington; over is 6-1-1 in last eight series tilts. Caps lost four of their last five visits to Music City. Washington won five of its last six games, but is 2-3 in last five road games- their last five games stayed under the total. Predators won four games in row overall, but lost two of last three at home. Three of their last four games went over the total.

Flyers won five of last six games with Minnesota; they won their last three visits to Twin Cities. Under is 2-0-2 in last four series games. Philly lost six of its last nine games; they split last four road games. Four of Flyers’ last five games stayed under total. Minnesota won last two games 1-0/3-0; under is 5-2-1 in their last eight games. Wild split their last six home games.

Las Vegas lost five of last seven games; they’re 3-5 on road. Over is 7-2 in Knights’ last nine games. Edmonton lost its last two games; three of their last four went OT/SO. Oilers lost three of their last four home games. Four of Oilers’ last five games stayed under.

Kings are 5-3 in their last eight games with Vancouver; over is 3-2-1 in last six series games. Canucks lost three of last four games in Staples Center. Vancouver lost five of last seven games, losing 5-0/4-1 in last two- they’re 3-2 in last five road games. Under is 7-3 in their last ten games. Los Angeles lost its last there home games, three of last four overall; five of their last six games went over total.

Armadillosports.com

NHL Picks and Betting Tips
By Parker Michaels
Bangthebook.com

MORNING LINE REPORT

A tough November continues as our road dog of Dallas looked more like a lost puppy in the third period last night after a really strong start. The Stars completely dominated the Canes in the early going but it was unbelievable how the puck was bouncing against them and then a blown tire by a Stars defenseman led to a 2-on-0 and suddenly it was a head-scratching 1-0 deficit.

Let’s move onto tonight as we try to gain some momentum with a couple of ugly road pups against some inflated favorites who probably aren’t as good as their current record suggests.

BUFFALO SABRES @ PITTSBURGH PENGUINS

Projected Goaltenders
Buffalo – Robin Lehner (expected)
Pittsburgh – Matt Murray (expected)

Injury Report
Buffalo – Josefson (out), Bogosian (out), Ristolainen (out), Scandella (questionable)
Pittsburgh – Hunwick (out)

The Buffalo Sabres inconsistency continued on Saturday with a 2-1 overtime loss at Montreal. The Sabres have looked really good for stretches of games at times this year but have had trouble putting together complete 60-minute efforts from game to game.

Phil Housley is going to shake up his lines again tonight by moving Sam Reinhart up into the top six with Jack Eichel and Evander Kane. Reinhart has surprisingly been a mainstay of the third line this season but I like this move. The trio played at times together last year and had a lot of chemistry. Jason Pominville will drop to the third line which will hopefully create better balance.

The Sabres defense continues to be shorthanded as Rasmus Ristolainen will miss another game. Marco Scandella missed Monday’s practice with an illness. Housley is hopeful he’ll be okay to play tonight but we’ll said they’ll see how he feels this morning.

The Pittsburgh Penguins return home after dropping a pair of road contests over the weekend including Saturday’s 5-4 shootout loss at Nashville. The Penguins are one of only two remaining teams to be undefeated in regulation on home ice at 5-0-1 and after a road heavy schedule which included six back-to-backs already, the Pens will now play 13 of their next 19 games at home with just two back-to-backs.

Sidney Crosby’s goal scoring drought has reached 11 games and he’s tied with Kris Letang for the dubious distinction of the worst goal differential on ice in the entire NHL at -14. A visit from Buffalo sounds like a good remedy to break out of this prolonged slump. Bryan Rust got off to a hot start this season with points in five of his first six games but cooled off with just 1 assist over his next 11 games. Rust regained his confidence over the weekend with a goal and an assist and will be bumped up to play with Crosby and Guentzel tonight.

Despite the Penguins problems right now a return home should help cure some ails. The Sabres defense is still a mess and this seems like a great game for Sid and company to break out. There’s value in laying the moneyline straight up here but to limit exposure a bit we can look to play the Penguins in a ML parlay. The Oilers are another team tonight with value at a big number so by playing a parlay here we’re still getting considerable value but limiting our risk in the process.

COLUMBUS BLUE JACKETS @ MONTREAL CANADIENS

Projected Goaltenders
Columbus – Sergei Bobrovsky/Joonas Korpisalo (unknown)
Montreal – Charlie Lindgren (confirmed)

Injury Report
Columbus – Calvert (out), Wennberg (out)
Montreal – Hemsky (out), Schlemko (out)

John Tortorella was desperate for a win so he made the decision to play Sergei Bobrovsky on the second half of a back-to-back to try and snap the team out of a four game slide. That decision paid off as Bobrovsky made 32 saves on 33 shots in regulation and overtime and then stopped eight of nine shots in an exciting nine-round shootout before Jack Johnson scored the winner.

The Jackets are suffering from the injury bug a bit right now as the team is down three centers. Lukas Sedlak and Zac Dalpe remain out for time being and now Alex Wennberg didn’t make the trip to Montreal and will leave the Jackets without a key piece of their offense. Matt Calvert, their best penalty-killing forward, is also still out.

Columbus doesn’t play another back-to-back for two weeks so Tortorella will probably want to get Korpisalo a start before then. We’re likely to see Bobrovsky again tonight but with him coming off a hard weekend maybe Torts will go with the backup.

The Montreal Canadiens are 2-1-0 on their current six game homestand after Saturday’s 2-1 overtime win against Buffalo. An unlikely hero has emerged to help stabilize things for Montreal with goaltender Charlie Lindgren now 3-1-0 since taking over for an injured Carey Price and Al Montoya. Lindgren is expected to make his fifth consecutive start tonight but Price looks close to returning. He was on the ice again yesterday before the team practiced for about 30 minutes which included taking some shots.

This line looks right to me and unless Korpisalo gets the start we’ll pass on this one.

DALLAS STARS @ FLORIDA PANTHERS

Projected Goaltenders
Dallas – Kari Lehtonen (confirmed)
Florida – Roberto Luongo/James Reimer (unknown)

Injury Report
Dallas – Methot (out)
Florida – Huberdeau (questionable)

The Dallas Stars lost a tough game in Carolina last night. A 1-1 tie in the third quickly got out of hand and the final score of 5-1 wasn’t indicative of how close the game actually was. The possession battle at 5-on-5 was deadlocked at 50% for each side and Dallas actually won the overall Expected Goals battle 2.93 – 2.49. Expected Goals are an advanced metric you can find on Corsica.hockey and measures the quality of every shot attempt taken and are a better predictor for future goals than actual goals.

Ken Hitchcock seemed to let frustration get the best of him last night as he switched up his lines in the third period which led to the unraveling. After a five goal outburst the previous game and a boatload of chances through 40 minutes last night, Hitchcock went back to reuniting Seguin and Benn on the same line for some reason. The Stars were showing better balance with the duo centering separate lines and some bad puck luck during the first two periods seemed like an overreaction to make the change.

Kari Lehtonen will start tonight because Ben Bishop broke all of his sticks in the hallway after the game. Well, he only broke one but Lehtonen will still get the start tonight and he’s been pretty good this year, especially in comparison to his last few seasons. Lehtonen is 2-3-0 but has a .914 save percentage with a goals-against average of 2.40. His Goals-Saved-Above-Average is in the black at 0.32 which is the first time in four seasons he’s been on the plus side of that number. It’s still early, but his improved play is a welcomed bonus for the Stars.

The Florida Panthers likely deserved a better fate in Saturday’s 2-1 loss at New Jersey if not for the play of Cory Schneider. The Panthers dominated the third period with a 17-4 shots advantage but couldn’t find the equalizer. Florida has lost six of their past seven games, including four in a row on home ice.

Jonathan Huberdeau was absent from Monday’s practice with an illness but Boughner said he expected him to play tonight. We’ll see how he feels this morning. Jared McCann and Derek MacKenzie were also out yesterday. McCann won’t play tonight and MacKenzie is “very questionable” after leaving early last game due to a collision.

The Panthers second line has a new look as rookie Dryden Hunt joined Trocheck and Vrbata last game and will remain there tonight. Florida has had trouble replacing Jussi Jokinen on the left wing and when Finnish import Henrik Haapala had trouble adjusting to the North America game, it’s left a hole there all season.

No line available here yet and I don’t have my own number yet either. When I created my line for this one I came up with Florida -132/-141 and even with Dallas on a road back-to-back and Lehtonen in net, I feel like my number is way too high here for some reason and it just looks wrong. I’m going to re-run this one this morning once I have a moment and see if there was an error. I’ll update on Twitter.

ARIZONA COYOTES @ WINNIPEG JETS

Projected Goaltenders
Arizona – Antti Raanta (likely)
Winnipeg – Connor Hellebuyck (confirmed)

Injury Report
Arizona – Chychrun (out), Hjalmarsson (out)
Winnipeg – Perreault (out)

The Arizona Coyotes wrapped up a grueling stretch of games which saw them play 11 in 19 days while only managing two victories. The schedule win ease up considerably now although they will still travel a lot of miles the rest of this month, beginning with a four game trip through Canada tonight.

Tonight’s game will be a rematch of last game which saw the Jets walk away with a 4-1 win. The Coyotes scored the first goal for a league leading 13th time in 19 games but once again couldn’t follow-up with a complete 60-minute effort. Consistency has been the main issue for the young team but they had been showing signs of improvement before Saturday’s jagged performance.

A big reason for that recent improvement has coincided with the return of goaltender Antti Raanta who despite a 1-4-2 record has a solid .913 save percentage. The Coyotes have been more competitive recently because they’ve been giving up less goals and the play of Raanta is a big reason why.

The Winnipeg Jets return home from a three game Midwest road trip and will open a three game homestand after securing points in six of their last seven games. The Jets have looked a bit more vulnerable the past couple of games getting off to slow starts and not looking quite as sharp. It’s a tough travel month for them and they’ve already almost traveled as many miles in November as they did all of October.

Mathieu Perreault was no longer in a no-contact jersey at Monday’s practice and is likely to return later this week after missing the last 11 games. Maurice ruled him out for tonight but expects him to be in the lineup either Thursday or Saturday.
Defenseman Tyler Myers is okay to play tonight. It was worried he might have suffered a knee injury in Saturday’s game but returned to practice yesterday with no issues.

I know it’s the Coyotes and the Jets have been rolling but this line is crazy inflated. Arizona had two consecutive days off for the first time in three weeks so they were able to finally have a full practice to work on some things. I mentioned how the schedule will now ease up on them and the Coyotes should be a play-on team over the next few weeks. We’ll continue to get some inflated prices against them so hopefully we can scratch out a few wins with them, starting tonight.

WASHINGTON CAPITALS @ NASHVILLE PREDATORS

Projected Goaltenders
Washington – Braden Holtby (expected)
Nashville – Pekka Rinne (likely)

Injury Report
Washington – Burakovsky (out), Niskanen (questionable)
Nashville – Ellis (out), Weber (doubtful), Hartnell (doubtful), Bonino (questionable)

The Washington Capitals have turned their season around thanks to finding their home ice dominance again as they won their fourth consecutive game at Capital One Arena with Sunday’s 2-1 shootout win over Edmonton. Now the Caps will try to find some consistency on the road as the team have alternated wins and losses through their first ten road games, their last effort a 3-1 setback at Buffalo.

Braden Holtby continues to be the best player on the ice for Washington night after night and he earned the NHL’s third star of the week after three wins and a .952 save percentage. The defense has also been showing improvement in front of him as the team’s young players are starting to find some consistency. John Carlson has stepped up in the absence of Matt Niskanen to help stabilize the backend and rookies Christian Djoos and Madison Bowey are quickly beginning to look like the top prospects they were pegged as. Bowey’s return from injury last week was a welcomed sight and the return of Niskanen could be as early as tonight. Niskanen traveled with the team and is hopeful to get back into the lineup on this two game trip.

The surging Nashville Predators have won four straight games after Saturday’s 5-4 shootout win over Pittsburgh and their newest acquisition made an immediate impact. Kyle Turris scored his first goal as a Predator in his debut and added an assist.

Nashville looks like a pretty dominant team right now with the simple addition of Turris and they might be even healthier down the middle as Nick Bonino took regular line rushes in yesterday’s practice and could return tonight. I couldn’t find a confirmation so it’ll be something to look for in today’s morning skate.

As great as everything looks for the Predators at the moment there is a little bit of bleak news as Scott Hartnell and Yannick Weber are both doubtful for tonight. Hartnell left Saturday’s game and did not return while Weber missed Monday’s practice with an apparent lower-body injury. The only confirmation we’ve received is Laviolette saying both are “out right now” which could have just meant for yesterday but sounds like we won’t see either player tonight.

Nashville is a scary good home team and they’re rolling right now with the addition of Turris and possible return of Bonino. The loss of Hartnell and Weber are low-key significant in my opinion and the Caps are rolling themselves right now. We’re likely to see inflated lines on the Predators for a bit after the big trade but they’re a good enough team to back it up so we’ll have to be careful in picking our spots against them. This is a tough pick but seems like a good spot so we’ll play the value on the Capitals tonight and hope Holtby can continue his hot play and steal one for us.

PHILADELPHIA FLYERS @ MINNESOTA WILD

Projected Goaltenders
Philadelphia – Brian Elliott (confirmed)
Minnesota – Devan Dubnyk (likely)

Injury Report
Philadelphia – Patrick (out), MacDonald (questionable)
Minnesota – Parise (out), Coyle (out)

The Philadelphia Flyers have alternated losses and wins over their last five games and the inconsistencies of a young team are beginning to show after a hot start. The Flyers will complete a home-and-home with the Wild tonight after being shut out for the fourth time this season in a 1-0 loss on Saturday.

The top line has continued to do the heavy lifting for the Flyers but Hakstol is concerned with the secondary scoring so will make some changes for tonight. Most notably, third-line winger Jordan Weal will jump up to center the second line between Dale Weise and Wayne Simmonds. Weal is a natural center and I think this is a great move as the kid has a lot of potential. I think he should be able to thrive in the higher role and will hopefully be the key to getting Simmonds going again. Simmonds opened the season with a hat trick and scored six goals in his first eight games but has now gone nine straight without one. He’s dealt with a number of nagging injuries which is no doubt limiting him in some regard but they need his goal scoring to return.

Defenseman Andrew MacDonald may return tonight. He traveled with the team and sounds like he’ll be back in the lineup but I was unable to officially confirm his status as of this morning. Nolan Patrick won’t play tonight but has traveled with the team and is hopeful to play in his hometown of Winnipeg on Thursday.

The Minnesota Wild return home after a four game road trip which ended with back-to-back shutouts for Devan Dubnyk. After being a surprise starter in Montreal after Alex Stalock was called home for the birth of his child, Dubnyk hasn’t allowed a goal against 73 shots.

There will be another streak on the line tonight albeit one of much higher rarity. Jason Zucker has scored the Wild’s last six goals spanning over their last three games and will look to tie an NHL record tonight with seven straight goals for his team.

This line is about where it should be so we won’t be getting involved here but it should be an interesting game to watch as Zucker goes for the record.

VEGAS GOLDEN KNIGHTS @ EDMONTON OILERS

Projected Goaltenders
Vegas – Maxime Lagace (expected)
Edmonton – Cam Talbot (expected)

Injury Report
Vegas – Sbisa (out)
Edmonton – Sekera (out), Slepyshev (out), Caggiula (questionable)

The Vegas Golden Knights hit the road again after a brief stop at home which produced a 5-2 win over Winnipeg. The Knights just completed a 1-4-1 road trip all will play eight of their next 13 away from the friendly confines of T-Mobile Arena and the Knights will need to figure out how to translate their home success onto the road.

Lucas Sbisa did not travel with the team and will miss the next two games. He’s been paired with Nate Schmidt and used as the team’s primary shutdown pair. Sbisa isn’t exactly that great of a defenseman and his absence could mean the insertion of Shea Theodore which would actually be a pretty significant upgrade. Gallant hasn’t revealed his lineup yet for tonight.

The Edmonton Oilers took five of a possible eight points on their four game road trip after Sunday’s 2-1 shootout loss at Washington and now return home for a pair of games. The Oilers showed signs of life on the road trip that weren’t present prior and are hoping to carry over the momentum back home. On Sunday, the Oilers actually dominated the Caps throughout the game controlling possession throughout and generating chance after chance while limiting Washington to just 19 shots. Unfortunately, they ran into a red-hot Braden Holtby.

This mini two game homestand for the Oilers is being treated as an all-or-nothing for the team as players are viewing it as must-win before heading back onto the road for a five game trip.

This is another big line today which looks a little short. We could play it straight up just like the Penguins but as I mentioned above I’d rather limit exposure and put them in a moneyline parlay. Playing both of these in regulation is an option as well, but I’m choosing to play it this way.

VANCOUVER CANUCKS @ LOS ANGELES KINGS

Projected Goaltenders
Vancouver – Anders Nilsson (expected)
Los Angeles – Jonathan Quick (expected)

Injury Report
Vancouver – Tanev (out), Stecher (out)
Los Angeles – Gaborik (out), Carter (out), Clifford (out)

The Vancouver Canucks wrap up a four game road trip tonight after a pair of disappointing results against the other two California teams. After a 4-1 loss at Anaheim and 5-0 spanking at San Jose, the Canucks might turn to new father Anders Nilsson to get them back on track. Travis Green has been mixing and matching his starting goaltender based on the opposing style of the match-up and with the Kings being a heavy team looking to crash the net, it would seem like Nilsson would be the most efficient choice for tonight.

Loui Eriksson returned to the lineup last game and played over 18 minutes back on a line with the Sedins. Green is shaking up the rest of his lineup tonight in an attempt to get one of their best offensive threats going. Markus Granlund scored 19 goals last season but has been used primarily in a shutdown role on a line with Brandon Sutter and Derek Dorsett this year. Green will move him to center tonight between Sam Gagner and Thomas Vanek and allow him to be freer offensively.
The Los Angeles Kings have dropped back-to-back games for the first time this season after Sunday’s 2-1 loss to San Jose and problems which were being masked in the early going are starting to show through.

The Kings are having a lot of trouble on their breakouts and are turning the puck over at an alarming rate. It’s been an issue all season but the outstanding goaltending of Jonathan Quick was covering a lot of the mistakes up.

The Kings record has us seeing some inflated lines on them so we’ll grab the value on another big ugly road dog tonight with the Canucks.