Written by LineStar Fantasy Wizard @ZeroInDenver

Welcome back to the NHL Hat Trick.

Happy Sports Equinox. We have a full slate for NHL, but we also have baseball, football, and basketball on tap tonight. Should be a busy DFS night!

I want to point out a couple tools in the LineStar app that I look at daily that some people might not know about.

First one is the Salary Comparison tool:

I use this tool more if I'm playing on two sites, but it's also useful to see possible value. For example, Evgeni Malkin is $6700 on DraftKings tonight, but $8600 on FanDuel. This means that I might be more likely to play Malkin on DraftKings but less interested on FanDuel.

Next one is the Perfect Lineup tool:

I've found this helpful in learning lineup construction (if you're new to NHL DFS or struggling to find success this season) as well as seeing average salaries by position in perfect lineups. For example, take note that on DraftKings, the average salary for goalies that end up in perfect lineups is a little over $7700. This tells me that I don't necessarily need to spend up each night, but I probably don't want to punt at goalie either.

Of course, if you have any other questions, be sure to tag me in chat at @ZeroInDenver. Also, as a side note, I'll be taking some time off over the next several days. I'll be back next Wednesday, but will try to dip into chat when I can.

That said, let's hop into this 9-game slate.

Goaltending

My three favorite goaltenders on the night:

Andrei Vasilevskiy, TB (vs DET) (DK: $8.5K, FD: $9.1K)

Vasilevskiy is heavily favored tonight against a Detroit team that's scoring 2.29 goals a game. Vasilevskiy also has a .951 save percentage this season and a 1.67 goals against average. Expensive, but worth spending up for tonight.

Keith Kinkaid, NJ (vs COL) (DK: $7.9K, FD: $8K)

Kinkaid has had an amazing start to the season and shut out Dallas his last night out. His price has gone up on DraftKings, but I still love him at that price. He gets a fairly tough matchup against Colorado, but I have less interest in Colorado when they're on the road.

Corey Crawford, CHI (vs ARI) (DK: $8.3K, FD: $7.7K)

Corey Crawford is expected to start tonight for the first time since December 23, 2017. He had a 2.27 goals against average and a .929 save percentage before going down to injury. He gets a home matchup against the Coyotes, who have killed a good number of lineups for me this season. I still think that Arizona has been more unlucky than bad and will break out at some point. Maybe that's tonight, but I don't have a lot of interest in Arizona again Crawford.

#BiscuitInTheBasketWatchList 🚨

For those of you who aren’t familiar with hockey, “biscuit in the basket” is a term for scoring a goal. Here I’m going to give a center, wing, and defensemen for the top and value pricing tiers that I think has a good chance to score a goal. Remember - I gave some tips last week on numbers that I look for, and these players check most (if not all my boxes):

Joe Pavelski: SJ- C (DK: $6.2K, FD: $7.2K)

3.2 shots on goal, 2.6 high danger shot attempts and a 65% CF% as heavy favorites at home against Buffalo.

Patrick Kane: CHI - W (DK: $7.6K, FD: $8.3K)

Insane 6.6 shots per game and a 60% CF%.

Kris Letang: PIT- D (DK: $6.4K, FD: $6.3K)

One of my favorite players on the slate. 3.2 shots a game, 1.6 blocks a game, and over 26 minutes of ice time.

Value Sticks 💲

Similar to the biscuit-in-the-basket watch list, in this section I’ll provide a center, wing, and defensemen who are priced in the value tier. If I can find someone under priced on both sites, I’ll highlight them. But in some cases, it could be site specific.

Tyler Johnson: TB– C (DK: $5.1K, FD: $4.7K)

Coming off a hat trick and gets a good matchup against Detroit. Slotted on the second line and second powerplay unit.

Cam Atkinson: CLS - W (DK: $6K, FD: $7K)

4.2 shots on goal a game and playing a Philly team that is giving up 4.11 goals a game.

Darnell Nurse: EDM - D (DK: $4.4K, FD: $4.4K)

4 shots and 1 block a game over the last 5 games and on the second powerplay unit for Edmonton.

Bottom of the Barrel

I did this last season, and I’ll do it again this season. These are the players in the bottom of the salary barrel but are in a good spot.

Adam Lowry: WPG - C (DK: $3.2K, FD: $3.5K)

Jean-Sebastien Dea: NJ - W (DK: $3.2K, FD: $3.3K)

Ryan Murray: CLS - D (DK: $3.5K, FD: $3.7K)

Line Stacks

Line stacking is a common strategy in GPP. You'll see a lot of winning lineups where players are stacked from the same forward lines or power play lines. Here are some of my favorites today:

SJ: Kane-Pavelski-Labanc (DK: $17.3K, FD: $18.6K)

Favorite stack of the night.

CLS: Panarin-Dubois-Atkinson (DK: $17.6K, FD: $21K)

Philly has been giving up a bunch of goals. Love this line tonight.

TOR: Marleau-Matthews-Kapanen (DK: $19.1K, FD: $18.7K)

Matt Murray is starting for Pittsburgh and I love how this line, especially Kapanen and Matthews, have been playing together.

Risk-It-For-The-Biscuit Stack 🍪

CHI:  Fortin-Schmaltz-Kane: (DK: $15.9K)

I think this is a great value stack for tonight that has a lot of upside. Combined, they have the highest shot attempts for lines on the slate.

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