We’ll be seeing 2-game slates all week as these teams will play every other day with the Preds/Jets and Penguins/Capitals synced up on the days these teams don’t play. Here are a few players we’re taking a close look at in all formats, with Awesemo starting with a quote, then I (Tommienation1) following up.
Top-Tier
Brent Burns ($6,500 DK/$7,200 FD)
“Burns makes sense in all formats tonight, as he has the highest floor of any player on the slate because of his ice time and shot volume.”
Burns (“A” points grade) is coming off a game where he attempted 17 (Yes, 17) shots with 9 of them coming at even-strength. Granted, it was a double-overtime game, but nonetheless, Burns was firing at will and created 6 Scoring Chances himself. With him being priced this moderately on DraftKings, he makes for a very tough fade, as he has the best chance to lead all defensemen in raw points. The ownership for him will be huge, but I love him in all formats tonight against a Vegas team that has been short-handed over 4 times per game in these playoffs.
Nikita Kucherov ($7,500 DK/$8,500 FD)
“Kucherov’s team has the highest implied total on the slate tonight (3.3), and being the primary goal scorer, it’s hard not to love him in a must-win game.”
Kucherov (“A” points grade) was already mentioned in the stacks article, but he has to be one of the top all-around plays on the slate tonight. Despite recording only 2 shots on goal with no points, Kucherov led the Lightning in shot attempts and Scoring Chances in Game-1, and he’s got a great chance to do that again tonight. Since TB is at home again, they’ll get to put Kucherov in favorable spots as they have the benefit of last-change. Outside of the good even-strength matchups, it’s hard to imagine him going another game without getting on the scoresheet, so he’s one of my favorite spend-up options.
Value
Alex Killorn ($3,900 DK/$4,500 FD)
“Killorn saw over 16 minutes in Game-1 and plays on the stacked Tampa Bay top power-play, making him a great value on both sites.”
Killorn’s line was great at even-strength in Game-1, doubling up their opponents in shot attempts, Scoring Chances, and High-danger Chances. Any exposure to Steven Stamkos and Nikita Kucherov is usually a good thing, and he’ll be on the top power-play with those two as well as Victor Hedman. In Game-1, Killorn had 5 shot attempts and 4 Scoring Chances despite only one shot on goal. As a cheap flier on DK or FD, I love the 3rd-line winger in both cash-games and tournaments.
Vegas D-Men: Theodore ($4,600 DK/$4,800 FD), Schmidt ($3,900 DK/$3,800 FD), Miller ($3,700 DK/$4,200 FD)
“The Vegas defensemen all provide some value on DK as they’ve been playing big minutes even in the non-overtime games these playoffs.”
All these guys are solid plays on both DraftKings and FanDuel as they will each get near 20 minutes of ice time and the all important power-play time we love to see. With the Golden Knights, there is no clear-cut top defensemen like there is with the other 3 teams (Krug, Hedman, Burns), so we can really go to any of these cheap D-men tonight for value. Miller usually sees the least ice time out of the three, but he is also the highest volume shooter of the bunch. Ranking them in terms of tournament value on DK, I would go Theodore, Miller, Schmidt, but you can correlate them with any of the top-6 Golden Knights forwards to get more GPP upside. Even Jon Merrill is viable as a mega-punt ($2,700) on DK as he should see 15-16 minutes of ice time once again.
