Welcome to the daily NHL betting market report, your source for comprehensive and dynamic hockey betting analysis. This page will be updated throughout the day as needed. Be on the lookout for player prop bets. All recommended bets are tracked as one unit (bet to win one unit on favorite and risk one unit on underdog) unless stated otherwise. If you want, you can use the model projection to bet in proportion to its perceived edge.
All game lines via VSiN NHL Odds Page. All stats courtesy of Evolving Hockey. Follow me on Twitter.
Market Report for Thursday, May 12th
There were no recommended bets on Thursday.
Record: 111-103, -1.75 units, -0.8 percent ROI
Note: Player prop bets (if any) can be found by scrolling to the bottom of the report.
Market Report for Friday, May 13th
It’s Friday the 13th, and three teams are facing elimination. I’m not superstitious, but I am a little stitious. Let’s look at things from a betting perspective.
Florida Panthers (-160) at Washington Capitals (+ 140)
Carter Verhaeghe leads the Panthers with 5 goals and 5 assists in 5 games played, which is 5 points better than Florida’s second leading scorer, Aleksandar Barkov, who has just one goal and four assists in the series. Verhaeghe is listed as a game-time decision heading into Game 6, but we will know his status shortly as warmups are just about to get underway in Washington. Regardless, the Panthers are going to need their top stars to shine brightly tonight if they want to avoid a Game 7. Barkov and Jonathan Huberdeau have each only potted one goal in five games, and Verhaeghe is the only player to light the lamp more than two times in this series. The Capitals will be without Tom Wilson again as he hasn’t returned to action since being injured in Game 1. It would give the Capitals a big boost if he was able to return in time for Game 7, but they’re obviously going to have to win Game 6 for that to be a possibility. I’m not counting the Capitals out, but the series was theirs for the taking and it’s going to be hard to get back into it. Washington was a much bigger underdog at home earlier in the series, and my model estimate falls around the midpoint of the moneyline odds i.e., -150 in favor of the road team.
New York Rangers (-125) at Pittsburgh Penguins (+ 105)
According to Sport Logiq, scoring chances in this series have been heavily tilted, 58-18, in favor of the Penguins with Sidney Crosby on the ice, and now that he’s been ruled out for Game 6, everything we thought we knew about this series has been turned upside down. For the Penguins, the best defense is a good offense, but if Crosby’s absence leads to the Rangers closing the gap and owning a bigger share of the shots and scoring chances, the chances of Louis Domingue being able to outduel Igor Shesterkin are going to be a lot slimmer in Game 6. Rickard Rakell might be back in the Penguins’ lineup, but we probably won’t know for sure until the teams take the ice for warmup. According to my model, the Rangers should be priced around -130 with Crosby out for Game 6.
Calgary Flames (-160) at Dallas Stars (+ 140)
Dallas has scored eight goals in five games, but two of those goals were scored on an empty net, and the Stars have only scored more than two goals in one game out of the five. Neither team has had much success on the power play, but Dallas has generated just 7 high danger shots with the man advantage in the series so far, according to hockey stats website Natural Stat Trick. There’s been a tough of talk about Jake Oettinger, and rightfully so, but Jacob Markstrom has been phenomenal and he and his .952 save percentage are going to be tough to beat if Dallas can’t muster up more than the 25 shots per game that they’ve averaged through the first five games. The Flames are the better team in just about every area of the game, but the Stars do have a solid game plan. However, it’s hard to play shutdown defense for a full 60 minutes, and the Flames have shown that they’re able to break penetrate the Stars’ defensive system if given enough time to do so. The fact that Dallas is such a low scoring team helps, too. If the Stars had more offense, this series would be a lot tougher to handicap, but I’m confident in my model’s assessment of the series and it suggests that the Flames should be priced around -175 in Game 6.
Pick:
Calgary Flames -160
Bet Summary:
Calgary Flames -160
Player Prop Bets:
Record: 115-113, -11.1 units, -4.11 percent ROI
There are no recommended player prop bets currently.