Written by LineStar Fantasy Life Coach @ZeroInDenver. Got NHL DFS questions or want to see something covered in this newsletter? Hit me up in LineStar Chat.

Welcome back to the NHL Hat Trick.

We get an insane 14 games on tonight's slate (no games tomorrow). Going to try to keep this brief and focus on the news you should know and key players that I like for tonight.

Here's how today's slate looks from a high-level, looking at numbers for each team over the past 10 games:

28 teams on a slate can be intimidating, so I've built my own model for projecting teams that should score (or allow) the most goals tonight:

Before we dive in, let's recap what we know so far this morning:

Starting Goalies:

✅ Anton Khudobin vs ✅ Casey DeSmith

✅ Robin Lehner vs ✅ Alexandar Georgiev

✅ Frederik Andersen vs ✅ Curtis McElhinney

✅ Corey Crawford vs ✅ Braden Holtby

✅ Carey Price vs ✅ Keith Kinkaid

✅ Tuukka Rask vs ✅ Jimmy Howard

✅ Alex Lyon vs ✅ Carter Hutton

✅ Roberto Luongo vs ✅ Louis Domingue

✅ Jake Allen vs 🅿️ Pekka Rinne

✅ Craig Anderson vs ✅ Devan Dubnyk

🅿️ Marc-Andre Fleury vs ✅ Darcy Kuemper

✅ Connor Hellebuyck vs ✅ BIG SAVE DAVE Rittich

✅ Jacob Markstrom vs 🅿️ John Gibson

✅ Semyon Varlamov vs 🅿️ Cal Petersen

Injuries/Notes:

• Sidney Crosby BACK ✅

• Niklas Bakstrom BACK ✅

• Evgeny Kuznetsov OUT 🚑

• TJ Oshie OUT 🚑

• Nico Hischier BACK ✅

• Patrik Berglund out 🚑

• Anton Stralman out 🚑

• Cedric Paquette out 🚑

• Anton Stralman out 🚑

• Julius Honka out 🚑

• Marco Scandella out 🚑

Let me know if you find this info useful. 14 games tonight, so let's go!

Goaltending

Playing cash games? Fill in your goalie spot first. Playing tournaments? Fill your skater positions and pick the goaltender with the biggest upside for the least amount of salary. Here are my three favorite goaltenders on the night:

Frederik Andersen, TOR (vs CAR) (DK: $8.2K, FD: $8.9K)

Carolina is shooting the puck, a lot. They're averaging 71.8 shot attempts a game over the last 10 games, but are only averaging 1.98 goals a game during that period. If Andersen can keep the puck out of the net and get the win, it could be a huge night for him.

Darcy Kuemper, ARI (vs VAN) (DK: $7.5K, FD: $7.5K)

My favorite GPP play today. Vegas has played poorly, only winning 4 out of their last 10 games. Vegas is averaging 32 shots on net a game, so like I mentioned with Andersen, if Kuemper can keep the puck out of the net and get the win, he could have a big night.

Devan Dubnyk, MIN (vs OTT) (DK: $8.1K, FD: $8.8K)

I'm a mark for Dubnyk at home. He has a tough matchup against an Ottawa team that is scoring 3.9 goals a game over their last 10 games.

#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):

Brayden Point: TB - C (DK: $7K, FD: $7K)

Over the last 5 games, he's averaging 62 CF% with 3.2 shots on net and 1 goal a game and is facing a Panthers team that is allowing 3.6 goals a game.

Taylor Hall: NJ - LW (DK: $7.85K, FD: $7.8K)

There are a lot of top LW's on the slate today, but I like Hall the most. Philly is giving up 3.8 goals per game over the last 5 games. Hall is averaging a solid 3.4 shots a game and has played well against Philly in the past.

Mike Hoffman: FLA - RW (DK: $6.8K, FD: $6.2K)

Hoffman is on a 16-game point streak (with 9 goals and 10 assists) and is averaging 4 shots on net a game.

Thomas Chabot: OTT - D (DK: $6.5K, FD: $5.1K)

His price has been increasing on DraftKings but continues to hold on FanDuel. He's best on the slate for shots + blocks over the past 5 games and though he doesn't have a good matchup tonight, I'm going to continue to spend up for him.

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.

Anze Kopitar: LA - C (DK: $4.6K, FD: $6.6K)

He's a much better deal on DraftKings and he's starting to play much better, with a goal in each of his last two games and facing an Avs team that is giving up 3 goals a game over their last 5.

Brandon Saad: CHI - LW (DK: $4.3K, FD: $4.9K)

Holtby is starting for Washington but was a little bit rushed in returning, as Copley was chased in his last start. Saad plays on the top line and second powerplay unit for Chicago and is averaging 3 shots on net a game over his past 5 games.

Craig Smith: NSH - RW (DK: $5K, FD: $5.1K)

Smith is on the top line and top powerplay unit for Nashville and has been averaging 4.6 shots on net a game over the past 5 games.

Brandon Montour: ANH - D (DK: $4.3K, FD: $4.2K)

With Lindholm and Fowler out for the Ducks, Montour has had a decent increase in minutes, shots, and blocks over the last 5 games.

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 tonight.

Derick Brassard: PIT - C (DK: $3.5K, FD: $4.1K)

Filip Chytil: NYR - LW (DK: $3.9K, FD: $3.6K)

Drake Batherson: OTT - RW (DK: $3.9K, FD: $3.2K)

Aaron Ekblad: FLA - D (DK: $3.9K, FD: $4.7K)

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.

I’m going to try something a little bit different with stacks. I’m going to present my personal favorite, as well as a value stack, and one with the best matchup. Here are my three favorite stacks on the night:

BUF: Skinner-Eichel-Pominville (DK: $19.5K, FD: $19K)

I'm going to keep playing them while Buffalo continues to be hot. In 130 minutes at 5v5, they have a 59 CF% with 97 shots and 16 goals.

NJ: Hall-Hischier-Palmieri: (DK: $20.2K, FD: $20K)

Montreal has given up 3.8 goals a game over the past 5 games and this line has the second best matchup on the slate.

MIN: Parise-Koivu-Niederreiter: (DK: $16.9K, FD: $16.9K)

Ottawa has been pretty awful defensively and is averaging 4.4 goals allowed per game over their last 10 games.

Risk-It-For-The-Biscuit Stack 🍪

ANH: Rakell-Getzlaf-Kase (DK: $17K, FD: $17.1K)

This stack ranked pretty high in my model this morning so I think they're worth taking a flier on today. In 18 minutes of 5v5, they have a 65 CF% with 1 goal on 18 shots on net.

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