Written by LineStar Fantasy Life Coach @ZeroInDenver.

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Welcome to the NHL Hat Trick.

ICYMI - The NHL Season Preview & Strategy guide goes over the basics of NHL DFS and what I look for when researching players.

Today, I'm going to give my usual rundown of teams, stacks, and players that I like on the slate, but I wanted to take a look at lineup construction today.

For me, whenever I'm trying to learn a new sport, I take a good look at what other people are doing. How are others constructing lineups and how are successful people constructing lineups?

I've mentioned before, NHL is really random. There's essentially no floor and it's not uncommon for cheaper players to outscore expensive players any given night. My take, however, is to find a system that works well. While I'm not going to profit every night, I should be profitable in the long term with a successful system.

To me, that starts with stack types, since NHL is a stack-heavy sport. Looking at Friday's $10 GPP, you can see what people ran for stacks. Overall, 4-3 was the most popular stack (I'm not including goaltender in stacks)

For me, if I'm doing 150+ lineups, I tend to split between 3-3 and 4-3 stacks.

Can you win with other stack types? Absolutely. I think if you're running a handful of lineups, it might make more sense to run 3-2-2 or 2-2-2 stacks as you're not "all in" on a team or a stack.

Here's a chart of how the top 25 entries constructed their lineups. It's better viewed on a computer, but you can see the score, stack type, teams they stacked, whether they stacked even strength (EV) lines or power play (PP) lines, and whether they correlated their goalie.

You'll see a lot of Vegas stacks won. Here's an overall look of lineups with stacks by teams and you can see that Vegas was overwhelmingly chalk.

There's always an easier path to the top if you fade chalk and chalk busts, but I don't think you have to fade the chalk. There's a lot of ways to make your lineup different in NHL DFS.

With that said, let's take a look at tonight's slate... LETSSSSSSSSSSGOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Tonight's Slate

FYI - Tonight's slate locks an hour later than usual at 8PM EST.

Here's numbers on the teams from their past 10 games. Generally, I start my research by looking for teams in good spots. For example, teams that score goals (GF60) that are facing teams that give up goals (GA60). I also look at teams that shoot a lot (CF60) that are facing teams that give up a lot of shots (CA60).

Based on this, teams that stand out to me are COL, MON, OTT, STL, MIN, and EDM

Goaltender Rankings

How to Read This: 

I'm giving you a comparison of LineStar projections vs the average fantasy points scored over their last 10 games. I've also given you their save percentage (over 0.910 is ideal), goals allowed (lower is better), saves per game (more is better), GAA (Goals Saved Above Average), and my projected upside for each goalie.

Generally, if I'm stacking a team, I'll correlate a goalie if I can. In GPPs, I may not have the salary to make this work. In this case, I usually spend down on someone that I expect will take a lot of shots and could pick up the W.

As always - double-check that your goalie is starting before the game starts.

My Favorites:

CASH: Marc-Andre Fleury - VGK (DK: $8100, FD: $8100)

GPP: Thatcher Demko - VAN (DK: $7300, FD: $7000)

Forwards and Defensemen Rankings

How to Interpret C/D/W charts: In NHL DFS, I think it's most important to look at peripheral stats instead of goals which is why I put so much emphasis on shots. This includes shot attempts, high danger shot attempts (those shot attempts closest to the net with the highest probability of going into the net), shots on goal, and scoring chances. I've included projections and average fantasy points to see how each compares so you can more easily find value.

Center

My Favorite

THE GREAT TYSON JOST - COL (DK: $2600, FD: $3200)

McDavid (and Draisaitl) are obvious plays tonight, but if you want either one (or both) you're going to spend down. For me, I think THE GREAT TYSON JOST is worth a shot in your lineup with as well as the second and third lines for Colorado have been playing with MacKinnon out.

Wing

My Favorite:

Evander Kane - SJS (DK: $6100, FD: $6700)

I love Kane's shot volume and the scoring chances he sees each night. He gets a pretty good matchup against a St Louis team that has allowed 3.1 goals a game over their last 10.

Defensemen

My Favorite

Torey Krug - STL (DK: $5600, FD: $5300)

I like St Louis tonight against the Sharks and getting a PP1 D for under $6K makes this easy pick for me.

Bottom of the Barrel

Here are my cheap calls for a skater to pick up a goal or assist.

Zach Sanford: STL - C (DK: $3.9K, FD: $4.4K)

Joel Armia: MON - W (DK: $3.8K, FD: $3.7K)

Marco Scandella: STL- D (DK: $3.6K, FD: $3.9K)

Line Stacks

Here are my ranked stacks for tonight. I like to target stacks that correlate, meaning the players all share time on the ice at even strength, and on the power play. BOS1, COL1, and VGK1 are examples of that. However, that doesn't stop me from playing other stacks that I like on the night.

Favorite Stacks Tonight:

Risk-It-For-The-Biscuit Stacks:

These are stacks that I think have the ability to go off and will probably go under-owned tonight.

Disclaimer: Keep in mind, plays and thoughts listed are my own. You should all do your own research and you might (and probably should) disagree with me in some spots. Don't be afraid to go your own way.

Good luck today! Tag me in the LineStar Chat @ZeroInDenver if you have any questions or feedback. Follow me on Twitter @ZeroInDenver.

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